


pizza and pajamas

by Izzi456



Series: Pizza Delivery Girl AU [1]
Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Danvers Sisters, F/F, Fluff, No Smut, What else is new, alex gets hurt in part iv but does not die, alex is a mess around maggie, awkward af!alex, brief karolsen, dontcha worry :), pizza delivery girl!au, pizza delivery girl!maggie, sanvers au, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2017-01-23
Packaged: 2018-09-12 23:17:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 35,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9095017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Izzi456/pseuds/Izzi456
Summary: Alex’s finger froze in place and her eyes widened as, under “Special Delivery Instructions,” she read:"send your cutest delivery girl, please ;)"A beat of silence. Then:“Oh. My. God.”“Alex, please don’t--”“What the  hell,  Kara?”Basically, an AU where Kara tries to get Alex to start dating again with an unusual plan, and Maggie is a pizza delivery girl





	1. Part I

**Author's Note:**

> picture Alex in the pajamas and hairstyle she was wearing in the last 2x08 sanvers scene :)

“We have to get you out there, Alex.”

A groan. “Not this again.”

“I’m serious, though. You can’t keep hanging out with me every Saturday night, it’s just sad.”

Alex looked at Kara, incredulous. “Hey, don’t say that. I love hanging out with you.”

Kara smiled at her but rolled her eyes, “But you should be going out.”

“We can go out, we don’t have to stay here.” As Alex said it, she realized she was in her pajamas and they couldn’t, in fact, go out. “I mean, I’ll have to change, but we can.”

“You know that’s not what I meant.”

Alex sighed, “Kara, please, can we just…enjoy the movie?” She gestured to the TV screen that was playing "Sleepless in Seattle."

Alex watched as Kara crossed her arms and pouted, which meant she wasn’t going to drop it. “I can’t enjoy the movie knowing that you could be out on a date right now but you’re not because of…whatever reason you’ve come up with in that head of yours.”

Alex rolled her eyes. “Jeanine broke up with me like a month ago.”

Kara sat up and threw her hands in the air, “Exactly! A whole month! You’re long past the wallowing stage and you’re now in the acceptance stage, which means you should _accept_ my offer of setting you up.”

Alex pursed her lips and stared at her sister, who wasn’t uncrossing her arms. Kara raised her eyebrows in response.

Six seconds. That’s how long Alex was able to challenge Kara’s defiant stare before a defeated, “Fine.”

A smile grew on Kara’s face and she let out a little squeal. “Yes! Okay, let’s see…who can I set you up with…”

“You don’t even have anybody in mind? You’re just going to grab some random stranger off the street or something, aren’t you?”

Kara scoffed, “Of course not! Give me some time, you just gave me permission. It wasn’t like I was already looking around or anything.”

Alex smiled, turning back to the movie. “Uh huh, sure.”

Kara ignored her. “Well…I, for one, am hungry again. We should order something.”

Glad to be off the subject of her non-existent love life for the time being, Alex quickly pushed herself up off the couch to get her computer, “Pizza?”

“Do you even have to ask?”

Alex walked over to the counter and grabbed her laptop, slumping back down on her couch with it. She clicked onto the Stilton Pizza site, which was in her bookmarks, entered their information, and added a large Hawaiian pizza to the cart. She then wordlessly handed the laptop to Kara so she could add more to the order. Alex knew it would take awhile as Kara took her pizza very seriously and she knew that Alex would let her order only one other pizza, so Alex got up again.

“I’m going to the bathroom -- my wallet is on the coffee table. _Don’t_ order too much.”

But Kara was too concentrated on the computer and just waved Alex off.

As Alex washed her hands after using the restroom, she thought that maybe Kara was right (although she’d never tell her that).

It _had_ been a month since she and Jeanine had broken up…well, since Jeanine had dumped her. They hadn’t even been together for very long, but it was an important relationship – at least for Alex. Alex had only figured out she was gay about six months ago, and it had been a rocky six months since then, to put it simply. Between Alex refusing to do anything about it for a whole month, finally getting a date, getting stood up from said date, finding Jeanine after reluctantly going on a couple of other dates, and then being dumped by her after a record two and a half months together, “rocky” was the only word Alex could use to describe it.

Alex had to remind herself that people went through this, that this was what dating was like, and that she was just going through it all a little later. At least, that’s what she told herself so she could cope with it.

Alex shook her head as she grabbed a towel to dry her hands, trying to forget about those god-awful nights she had spent crying about Jeanine. Kara had been there for her whenever she felt like venting, crying, or not talking -- which had seemed to be her only three moods during that time. Alex was determined not to let that happen again, but Kara seemed so eager to get Alex back out even when Alex felt like, and had tried to tell her, that it was just going to be an endless cycle of first dates and heartache. 

Kara, being herself, had rejected those statements immediately and pushed forward, and now, it seemed, had finally gotten Alex to agree to go on a date. The sisters _were_ running out of new rom-coms to watch and had had to go for re-watches of classics most Saturday nights, which Alex didn’t mind much. But, admittedly, she could only watch Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan fall in love so many times before she was bound to get tired of it.

So maybe, _maybe,_ letting her sister set her up on a date wasn’t such a bad idea.

And besides, Kara knew Alex better than anyone, so she would know if someone was worth setting her up with. Alex had total faith in her, and she just hoped she wouldn’t have to regret that faith.

Alex whipped her head around as she heard a small, muffled giggle from outside her bathroom door. As a trained DEO agent, Alex always noticed every little sound, but tried to calm her beating pulse as she realized that Kara was just laughing at the movie.

As Alex opened the door, she heard and saw a flash of Kara quickly shutting her laptop closed. She narrowed her eyes in suspicion as Kara turned around and smiled at her. 

“You’re back. You missed a good part,” Kara said, smiling even wider, as if she couldn’t hold whatever it was she had done in.

Alex ignored her, instead asking, “You’re already done ordering?” Kara nodded, so Alex immediately followed with, “What did you do?” because Kara was _never_ done ordering that fast.

She looked back and forth between Kara and her laptop, which the younger girl was holding onto quite tightly. Alex wasn’t sure if her laptop was going to survive under Kara’s super strength, but Kara knew her limits by now and Alex hadn’t heard a crack or anything…yet.

Kara shrugged and turned away from Alex, “What do you mean? I just ordered more pizza.”

“Kara,” Alex said, a warning in her voice. She walked over to the couch, sitting down next to Kara, who was pointedly not looking at her. “Did you order more than one?”

Kara shook her head, “No, just a pepperoni.”

Then, Alex realized that Kara was speaking in short sentences, which meant she was trying not to say too much, which in turn meant that she was definitely hiding something.

“Let me see the laptop,” Alex said, gesturing for Kara to hand it over, but Kara didn’t budge.

“Kara, if there’s nothing wrong, if you did _nothing wrong,_ then give me my laptop.”

They both knew Kara was stuck. Alex raised her eyebrows as she held her hand out. Finally, Kara pursed her lips and slowly placed the laptop in Alex’s hand.

Alex flipped the laptop around so it faced her and pulled it open, “Thank you.”

Kara just turned back to the movie, her hands down in her lap, clenched together. Alex glanced at her but she was seemingly very concentrated on the TV screen, although a small smile did peak out. Alex wondered what she could have possibly done that she was acting so guilty, and kind of happy, about. Kara knew that Alex wouldn’t really get all that mad at her if she had ordered more than one other pizza, so this was definitely because of something else.

Alex turned her attention back to her laptop and the order window was still up – Kara, it seemed, hadn’t managed to close it in time. Alex scanned her eyes over the screen and saw two pizzas: one large Hawaiian and one large pepperoni. That was it. So Alex knew she definitely wasn’t lying about _that,_ at least.

Scrolling down, Alex glanced back at her sister again, whose grin had gotten even bigger. Alex then continued her search and didn’t notice anything strange until her eyes landed on something at the bottom of the screen.

Alex’s finger froze in place and her eyes widened as, under _**“Special Delivery Instructions”**_ , she read:

 _**send your cutest delivery girl, please ;)**_

A beat of silence. Then:

“Oh. My. God.”

“Alex, please don’t--”

“What the _hell,_ Kara?” Alex practically shouted, unable to move except to open her mouth to yell at her sister.

She read what Kara had typed out again. And again. And again as she tried to both comprehend what she was reading, but also pretend like it wasn’t there. 

Alex finally tore her eyes away from the screen to see Kara already looking at her. 

Kara chewed her lip as Alex glared at her and she stuttered out, “Okay, well, see…I thought that…”

“You thought what?” Alex asked. Kara closed her mouth and stayed silent, sensing that whatever she said wasn’t going to stop Alex at the moment. “I don’t think you _thought_ at all, Kara. _‘Send your cutest delivery girl’?_ I literally just told you not to -- and you just said you weren’t going to -- try and set me up with some stranger, and yet…you do _this_?”

“Well,” Kara shrugged, strangely calm and not cowering under Alex’s anger, “at least she’ll be cute.”

Alex groaned, squeezing her eyes shut. “Kara, I’m serious. I don’t want to go on a date with some pizza delivery girl I’ve never even met!”

Kara was definitely trying not to a smile as she asked, “Why not?”

Alex groaned as she dragged a hand over her face, ignoring Kara’s question. “I was in the bathroom for two minutes…”

Kara took Alex’s hand away from her face and squeezed it, tucking her legs under her so she was sitting cross-legged facing Alex. “Alex, c’mon, this could be fun! I want to set you up on a date, and this just…I don’t know, came into mind. Besides, I already confirmed the order, what’s done is done and--” she leaned over towards Alex to look at the computer, “--we have forty minutes until she gets here whether you like it or not. Plus, there are many factors that could…you know, go wrong, so…you probably won’t even have a chance to ask her out.”

Alex just looked at her and was silent for a moment before curiosity got the better of her and she asked, “What do you mean?”

“Well, for one, she could be straight and be expecting us to be, you know, guys. Two, she could be a teenager or something, and three, she could be in a relationship.”

“Yeah, I guess she is probably going to be expecting some douchebag who just wants to get laid. But Kara, you put a winky-face on the end, I’m sure whoever they send will be single, at least.”

“Okay, fine. But there’s still two other very-likely-to-happen possibilities that could make her un-dateable. And who knows, maybe Stilton’s doesn’t have any cute delivery girls on hand to send over, so this might all be for nothing.”

Alex sighed and shook her head. The problem wasn’t that it could be a twenty-something pizza delivery girl. She didn’t care at all if this woman was out of college and delivering pizza on Saturday nights. What she did care about was that Kara had obviously decided on a whim that this was a great idea, and didn’t even think about how Alex hadn’t wanted to be set up with some stranger neither of them had ever even met. But, Alex thought as she looked at her sister’s hopeful expression, she really did want to get Alex back out there. This just…happened to be a strange way of doing it.

Kara let go of her hand and Alex turned back to the computer, scanning over the order again. 

It was sent, and the little “Progress” bar at the top indicated that they were already preparing the pizza, so Alex reluctantly realized that they could not, in fact, cancel it now. She could probably call the place and beg them to, but she found herself, for some strange reason, not really wanting to try that hard.

“If you really don’t want to talk to her at all, Alex, you don’t have to. I just thought it would be kind of fun. People meet people that they end up with in strange situations all the time. I mean, this could be how you meet your soulmate.”

Alex narrowed her eyes and looked at her sister, “Soulmate? Seriously?”

“I’m just saying. It does happen. And if it works out, you’ll have me to thank.”

Alex shook her head and couldn’t keep in a small, amused smile that appeared on her face, “I can’t believe you did this.”

Kara smirked, squeezing Alex’s knee. “I knew you wouldn’t be mad at me for too long.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m still mad. I thought you were going to set me up with someone you knew, someone who you had, you know, pre-screened. I really don’t think this is going to work, Kara, as much as you might want it to.”

But Kara just shrugged. “Yeah, it might not. But it also might. I promise, if this goes horribly wrong, I swear I won’t ever try to set you up again without ‘pre-screening’ or whatever you just called it.”

Alex raised her eyebrows and crossed her arms, “And?”

Kara pursed her lips, “And I’ll let you keep whatever’s left over of the pizza we just ordered.”

Alex just stared at her -- they both knew that there wasn’t going to be much leftover pizza -- and repeated, “And?”

“And…you can pick which movies we watch for the next two weeks.”

Alex contemplated Kara’s offer and replied, “Three.”

Kara rolled her eyes. “Fine, three weeks. Unless I’ve set you up on an actual date by then.”

Satisfied, Alex nodded and took a deep breath, already regretting what she was going to say.

“Alright, you’ve got yourself a deal.”

Kara beamed, “Really?”

“Unfortunately, yes, really.”

“Yes! Oh Rao, I’m so excited! This is going to be fun, whatever happens. I just know it.”

Alex liked seeing her sister so thrilled about something that she found she didn’t really mind if it worked out or not. Besides, this was probably not going to go to plan, and she’d get pizza and movie choices out of it, or, if she was extremely lucky and it did somehow go according to Kara’s insane plan, maybe a date. So, she reluctantly reasoned, this could only work out in her favor either way.

She just really hoped Kara’s happiness was worth the guaranteed embarrassment and humiliation she was going to experience when the pizza got there.

\---------------------------

\---------------------------

Alex was definitely not looking at the clock…again.

She was just hungry, and the pizza was supposed to be there in four minutes. The clock happened to be right above the TV which was playing the movie, so she really couldn’t help it if she glanced up every couple minutes to check the time as it was in her line of sight.

Kara had managed to stay calm for the past half hour but was now starting to wiggle around on the couch.

“Kara, please calm down.”

“But what if this actually works out?”

“It’s not going to.”

“But what if--”

Just then, Alex’s phone started ringing. “Stilton Pizza” popped up on the screen and Alex realized how sad it was that she had their number saved in her phone. The Danvers sisters would really have to branch out on their food orders one of these days.

Kara was about to grab the phone but Alex snatched it up, giving Kara a warning look.

She then answered it and held it up to her ear, “Hello?”

“Hi! This is Stilton Pizza, I have an order for Alex Danvers, apartment number 34?”

Alex couldn’t help it as her heart started beating a bit faster -- it was definitely a girl, and she didn’t sound too young. Alex looked at Kara, whose smile stretched from ear to ear, and knew she was using her super-hearing so she could hear the phone call with perfect clarity.

“Uh, yeah. Yup, that’s me.” Alex cursed silently, clearing her throat and willing herself to be more articulate. She ignored Kara, who was trying not to make any noise beside her. 

“Okay, great. I would have buzzed the apartment but the buzzer isn’t working down here, so can you let me in to the building?”

She sounded nice, at least. Alex prayed that she would be nice enough to either take the whole thing as a joke or just pretend like it didn’t happen.

“Oh, right. Yeah, just give me one second…” Alex hit Kara on the arm as she realized that _that_ was probably what they should’ve put on the Special Delivery Instructions. Alex got up and all but ran over to the buzzer box by her door, pressing the button. She could hear a faint ‘beep’ and click of the apartment building front door unlocking from the other side of the phone.

“Thanks!”

Then the line went dead.

Alex slowly brought her phone down from her cheek and turned around with a finger pointed towards her sister. “Kara--”

But Kara was already up off the couch and bouncing on the balls of her feet, “It’s a woman!”

“I know.”

“And she sounded nice, and not like a teenager!”

“I know. Please, Kara, don’t…freak out or whatever you’re doing. You’ll scare her off.”

Kara stopped bouncing and put her hands on her hips. “Oh, so _now_ you don’t want to scare her off, huh?”

Alex pursed her lips, “That’s not what I meant. I just meant that…she’ll think you’re crazy -- which you are -- if you keep bouncing up and down behind me while I pay for the pizza. You have to--”

“Wait a second!” Kara’s eyes widened and she looked Alex up and down. “You’re wearing pajamas.”

Alex looked down. She had on a dark blue button-up (and thankfully still had a bra on) and pajama pants. She had completely forgotten she was wearing pajamas, and looked back at Kara, who was not. 

“Shit.” Alex cared if anyone, especially if it was anyone she didn’t know, saw her in pajamas. She was going to have to change. And quickly. Or… “You know, maybe you should just pay for the pizza, I’ll stay in my room. I don’t think I’m going to be able to change--”

Kara shook her head and grabbed Alex’s arm, dragging her towards her room, “Oh, no you don’t. You’re not getting away with this that easy. Go grab some jeans or something, you can probably keep the top--”

Just then, Kara stopped and whipped her head around. Alex hadn’t heard anything, but then again, she didn’t have Kara’s alien hearing abilities.

“Wow, she’s fast,” Kara said, clearly impressed. She turned back to Alex and shrugged, her hand still gripping her arm. “Well, looks like you’re just going to have to talk to her like this, sorry.”

Alex’s eyes widened and Kara turned back around. She didn’t seem to care as Alex let out a laugh and exclaimed, “Wait, what? No! I am _not_ talking to some person I don’t even know while wearing my pajamas.”

But Kara just slowly released her hand from Alex’s arm and didn’t turn back to look at her. She seemed transfixed by something she saw through the wall.

Alex stared at Kara, wondering why she was just standing there. She momentarily forgot about running into her room to change.

“What? What’s going on?”

Kara shook her head a little bit and blinked. “Okay, wow. Now…I know I have a boyfriend, but _damn._ ”

Alex furrowed her eyebrows, “The pizza delivery girl?”

Kara nodded.

 _Oh, great,_ Alex thought. Just great. Apparently this woman was attractive and she had also sounded like she was around Alex’s age. Why was this plan working out like Kara hoped it would? Why did the universe hate Alex?

A toothless grin grew on Kara’s face as they both heard three short knocks on the door. Kara finally looked back at Alex and grabbed her arm again, this time pulling her away from the bedroom and towards the front door.

“Time to work your magic, Alex.”

“Wha-- But I’m wearing…I can’t-- I don’t even have any magic!” Alex tried to protest, but Kara was using some of her super strength to drag Alex towards the door, and Alex couldn’t stop her if she tried.

“Yes, you do. Now go get that date.” She squeezed Alex’s arm before letting go of it and pushed her a little bit towards the door. Alex just looked back at her as she backed away towards the living room. Kara raised her eyebrows and gestured towards the door as she sat on the couch. Then, she turned her attention towards the movie still playing on the screen.

So that’s how it was going to be. Alex knew Kara was only going to pretend to watch the movie but was actually going to be listening to them the entire time, and there was nothing Alex could do about it.

Alex sighed and took a deep breath, turning back towards her front door. _You can do this,_ she said to herself, repeating it multiple times. _Maybe she won’t notice the pajamas._

Then, she slowly placed her hand on the door handle and paused for half a second before turning it and pulling the door open before she lost her nerve.

Alex didn’t know why she was surprised -- especially after Kara had looked so awestruck by this woman -- when all she could think when she saw her was _‘Woah.’_

The pizza delivery girl -- woman, Alex corrected herself, _definitely_ a woman -- was slightly shorter than Alex and had dark brown hair that cascaded in waves down her shoulders. She looked to be around Alex’s age, and if Alex had to guess, she’d say probably a bit younger if anything. Her Stilton Pizza uniform apparently consisted of a white button-up and black skinny jeans, and Alex wondered whether the universe hated her, or maybe, just maybe, it really loved her.

The woman’s fist was frozen in mid-air as if she had been about to knock again, and Alex swore she stopped breathing for a second when a smile and two adorable dimples appeared on the woman’s cheeks as she put her arm down. 

There was a large black rectangular pizza holder balanced on her hip, and the hand not holding it was now resting at her side. She glanced down at Alex’s pajamas pants and back up, and only then did Alex remember that she was, in fact, wearing pajamas, which made her about ten times more nervous than she already was.

“You’re Alex Danvers?”

Alex realized after a second that she was just standing there, not saying a word, nor was she responding to the question.

“Yeah, yes. I am, sorry,” she nodded and tried clear her thoughts, all of which consisted of _‘holy shit.’_

She then willed herself to smile instead of staring at this woman with her mouth agape, which she knew it probably was, so she wouldn’t seem crazy. Alex also couldn’t seem to let go of the door knob even though she knew the door would stay put if she did. She just knew that right now she really needed something to hold on to.

The woman looked at her for a second with both an amused and also slightly confused expression on her face and Alex could’ve sworn she heard a small, “Huh,” from the woman before she glanced down at the receipts on the top of the pizza.

“Okay, well, great. So, you ordered…one large Hawaiian pizza, one large pepperoni,” she pointed at each item on the receipt as she listed them off, and then looked back up at Alex and pointed to herself as she smirked and said, “and a cute delivery girl, correct?”

Alex didn’t know whether to laugh or groan. She was going to have a word with Kara later (whether to get mad at her again or thank her, Alex wasn’t sure yet).

A small nervous laugh escaped Alex as she sighed and finally let go of the door handle. She closed her eyes for a second and when she opened them, the woman had started to unzip the black pizza holder, still keeping most of her attention on Alex.

“I’m so sorry, about that. My sister…” Alex shook her head, a smile on her face regardless, “She…it wasn’t me. She wrote that.”

Then, Alex could’ve sworn she saw the tiniest flash of disappointment cross the woman’s face as she turned her head to focus on getting the pizza boxes out of the black holder without dropping everything. “Oh, well…where’s your sister?”

Before Kara could even think about getting up, Alex blurted out, “But she wrote it for me, though.” The woman looked back at her, pausing for a second as she tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, and Alex lost her train of thought again. “She, um--”

“I wanted to set her up on a date,” Kara shouted from the couch.

The woman leaned slightly to the right to look around Alex’s shoulder even though she couldn’t see Kara as Alex was intentionally blocking her from view, but Alex knew she had definitely heard that.

Alex felt her face go red and she gripped the edge of the door. She turned her head sharply to glare at Kara, who glanced over and quickly turned back when she saw the expression on Alex’s face.

When Alex turned back to look at the pizza delivery woman -- she would really have to get her name and stop referring to her as the incredibly attractive pizza delivery woman in her brain -- she had gotten both pizzas out of the holder and placed them on top of it. 

“A date, huh? She thought you could land the cutest delivery girl?” The woman then put the hand not holding the pizza on her hip and smirked, nodding once in Alex’s direction. “Alright, let’s see what you got.”

Alex’s eyebrows shot up, and all she could think was: _Wait, what?_

Alex just looked at her. This was not happening. There was not an attractive woman with pizza telling her to hit on her, and Alex was not just standing there acting like a complete fool. The woman raised her eyebrows, not willing to let it go apparently, and Alex stood there for another second trying to unscramble the incoherent thoughts racing through her mind.

And then she decided that hey, she was here, and she was telling her to hit on her, so why not try? Except the problem with that was that Alex didn’t even think that this was going to happen in the first place, meaning that she didn’t have a pick-up line or anything. So, she decided to stall while trying to think of what to say.

“Um, okay, well,” she cleared her throat, unclenching her hand from the side of the door. “I’m kind of new to all this,” Alex said, trying to indicate what exactly she was new at, which was hitting on women specifically (not that she had a lot of experience hitting on men either), “But I suppose I can try, I guess. Actually I…I think it would be easier if I had your name.”

The woman shifted the pizza boxes on her hip and said, “It’s Maggie. Maggie Sawyer.”

 _Maggie._ Alex smiled and thought, _She definitely looks like a Maggie._

“Well, Maggie, I um…”

 _C’mon, Alex,_ she thought to herself, trying not to let the woman – Maggie – know just how hard she was concentrating at the moment. _You can’t be this much of a buffoon that you can’t even think of one, just one, pick-up line._ She took a deep breath, cursing herself into oblivion. 

Then, suddenly, she had one. One that was going to capitalize off of how pathetic she was around this woman.

“I…I don’t have a line,” she finally said.

“You had forty minutes before I got here and you can’t even come up with one line?” Maggie teased.

Alex was trying not to smile as she took a deep breath and said, “Well, I suppose I did have one, but then you showed up here looking like that and I found I couldn’t really think straight.”

Maggie just looked at her, a smile slowly growing on her face. Then, she actually _laughed_ and Alex thought that she had never heard a more beautiful sound.

“Wow. Story of my life.” She shook her head, amused. “That was pretty good.”

Alex bit her cheek to keep her smile from becoming too big, “Really?”

“Oh no, it was horrible. But the best one’s always are.” She winked and Alex felt a flush creep up her neck. A surprising success for Alex Danvers, apparently.

Maggie then looked away from her and took both pizza boxes in her right hand. Alex’s mouth definitely did not go dry when she noticed the muscle that appeared when she flexed her arm to do so. She then held them out to Alex and Alex took them quickly, realizing just how long she’d been holding them. Alex was about to turn around to go put them on the counter but Maggie had started to speak again.

“You know, this is going a lot better than I anticipated.”

Alex was sure that wasn’t true. “It is?”

Maggie nodded. “Oh yeah, definitely. I mean, I thought for sure you were going to be some fourteen-year-old hormonal asshat with his friends who wrote that for a dare or something, so…this is actually great. I mean, I’m pretty lucky ‘cause really, what are the chances that ‘Alex’ is a woman’s name and that you have so much game?” She licked and bit her lip and there was a twinkle in her eye.

Alex managed to laugh a little bit while simultaneously combusting inside. This woman liked her, at least a little bit, and she was cute but also hot and Alex had actually been able to complete a full sentence around her.

As much as she didn’t want to, Alex started to turn away from her to get rid of the pizza boxes but only got about halfway before she hit Kara. Kara beamed at her, took the pizza out of her hands, shoved something else in her left hand, and was gone before Alex figured out what had happened.

Alex slowly turned back around and saw that Maggie was already looking at her with an amused expression, having noticed the exchange.

“So, Alex, what do you do?”

“For my job?” Alex asked, just for clarification. Maggie nodded. “Oh, I um…” She paused, trying to think of what to tell her without lying about what she actually did. “I’m an agent.”

Maggie raised her eyebrows. “An agent, huh? Like Secret Service or FBI or something?”

Alex pursed her lips, really wishing she could tell her. “I can’t say.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Maggie said, nodding. “Well, I too, also lead a double life. At night, I deliver pizzas, and during the day I’m actually training to be a cop.” She stood up a little straighter as she said it.

Now it was Alex’s turn to be surprised. “A cop? For the NCPD?”

“Yup. Are you surprised?”

Alex willed her face to calm down and mask her surprise, “No, I’m not surprised…I mean, you certainly have the body for it.” _Goddammit, Alex,_ she groaned. “Oh god, I didn’t mean it like…”

But Maggie looked like she was trying not to laugh and thankfully skipped over Alex’s slip. “I just wanted to let you know that, so you didn’t think I had no real job and was stuck delivering pizzas on Saturday nights.”

She thought Alex cared about that? “Oh, I don’t think…I don’t have a problem with--”

“Hey, chill, I’m kidding,” Maggie said, about to touch Alex’s arm before she pulled her hand back.

Alex took a deep breath when she realized that Maggie was indeed kidding, willing herself to calm down. This woman made her so nervous.

“Thank you for the pizza, by the way,” Alex said when she realized she hadn’t yet thanked her. She cleared her throat, “Sorry, again, for the…well, you know, the note. And basically everything that comes out of my mouth.” Then, she looked down and realized that Kara had placed her wallet in her hand so she wouldn’t have had to go get it. “So, how much is it?”

As soon as she asked, she wanted to take it back as she realized that this – whatever this was – was probably going to end soon, and Maggie was going to leave, and Alex really didn’t want her to. But she also couldn’t think of any way to make her stay.

“Oh, right,” Maggie said, looking down at the receipt in her hand and pulling out a pen from her back pocket.

Alex watched as, after a few seconds, she seemed to decide something as she slowly crumpled the receipt in her hand and looked back up at Alex, smiling. “You know what? It’s on me.”

Alex’s eyes widened as she started to reach for the receipt, “Oh, no. No, no, no. I--”

Maggie held up a hand and Alex stopped talking, slowly shut her mouth, and leaned back.

“You didn’t let me finish.” She put her hand down. “It’s on me, but only if you take me out for dinner Friday night.”

Alex’s heart started to pound in her chest and she wasn’t sure what she had just heard, if she had heard it right. “What?”

“Next Friday. Well, I suppose it’s this Friday, actually. I don’t have work, so...”

Alex just looked at her. “You…You want to go on date with me?”

The right side of the Maggie’s mouth quirked up and she shrugged, “Well, after that incredible line you gave me, how could I not? And it didn’t seem like you were going to get up the nerve to ask me, so...”

Alex remembered just then that she had a mouth and that it did indeed work, so she used it. “Yes, yeah, of course I do want to…take you out, next Friday. This Friday.”

Maggie beamed at her, the dimples appearing again. “Okay, great. It’s a date then.”

She clicked the pen she was holding and looked down again, uncrumpling the receipts. Alex just watched as she smoothed them out and separated the Merchant copy and the Customer copy. Then, she took the Customer copy and flipped it over, pressing it against the wall next to Alex’s door frame. She wrote something on it and then smoothed it out a bit more.

Maggie turned back to Alex, holding out the receipt. When their fingers brushed as Alex took it from her, Alex swore she felt a tingling sensation make its way up her arm, but she knew that it was probably just her imagination.

Alex looked at the receipt and saw that Maggie had written her number on it, and Alex couldn’t stop the smile that formed on her face. How had she managed to do this? All the evidence pointed to an unfavorable outcome, and yet…

“You’ll text me and let me know where we’re going?” Maggie asked, and Alex tore her eyes away from the receipt. “This better be a great date, Alex Danvers.”

She reached down to pick up the black pizza holder from the floor and tucked it under her arm, putting the pen and the other copy of the receipt in her back pocket.

“Oh, yeah, I promise I’ll make it worth your while.”

“Yeah, you better. And maybe you could wear some actual clothes? Or maybe even a nice dress? I mean, the pajamas are cute, but…” She glanced down at Alex’s pajamas pants and back up, a small smile on her face.

Alex looked down and let out a breathy laugh, trying to ignore the flutter in her chest when Maggie said her pajamas were cute. “Yeah, I…I promise I won’t wear pajamas, either.”

Maggie just smiled, “Alright, good.” She turned and started walking down the hall, still facing Alex. “I’ll see you later, Alex.”

“Yeah, see you.”

When she turned around, Alex took a small step into the hallway and leaned against the door frame with her arms crossed, just watching her for a couple seconds with a small smile on her face. Before Maggie reached the stairwell at the end of the hall, Alex pushed off the door frame and went back inside, slowly shutting the door.

Alex closed her eyes and pressed her forehead against the now-closed door, clutching the receipt carefully in her hand so as not to crumple it again.

“How did you do that? I mean, I had total faith in you, obviously, but still.”

Alex turned around and saw Kara looking at her from the couch. She shook her head, “I have no idea.”

Kara just smiled and patted the couch cushion next to her. “I bet it was the pajamas.”

Alex laughed, walking over to and slumping down on the couch. “Probably.”

Kara bumped her shoulder and smirked at her, and Alex did it back. Kara then tucked her legs under her and turned back to the movie. “So, I really wasn’t paying attention to the movie, but I think it’s almost over…I already ate a slice of pizza…or two…while you were talking to her so…”

But Alex wasn’t really listening as she looked down again at the receipt in her hands. She smoothed it out against her thigh and looked at Maggie’s phone number scrawled on the back.

She then flipped the receipt over and scanned her eyes over the order. She was about to look up and start watching the movie again when something caught her eye.

There, at the bottom of the receipt under the space for “Order Total,” was a little empty box and, to the right of it, the words:

 _**Special Delivery Instructions Fulfilled?**_

As Alex looked at it, she smiled to herself. Then, she took one finger and pressed it against the receipt, slowly drawing a tiny “x” with her nail in the box.

 _Definitely_ fulfilled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: alex coming up with that line was...very similar to my thought process and how I came up with it. because i realized that if alex was going to have a pick-up line...then _I_ was going to have to come up with one and I was like "....crap" haha


	2. Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex takes Maggie, the pizza delivery girl/cop-in-training, on a 'special' date :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i wrote this whole beginning part just to make fun of how much of a Mess alex was during the first chapter, so a lot of the jokes come from that (just fyi, in case you wanna reread)
> 
> sorry alex, it was just too easy :)

“I still can’t believe she asked herself out, _for_ you.”

“…Yes, thank you for reminding me of that for the fifteenth time.”

“Are you going to frame the receipt?”

“Kara.”

“You should. I mean, you should at least keep it for the wedding.”

“Kara, I swear--”

“Do you still have it?”

“…Maybe.”

“I knew it. You know, you still haven’t thanked me.”

“Please, can you just…I’m trying to concentrate and it’s very hard when you’re pestering me.”

“Fine.”

“Thanks.”

“…Do you think she has a _thing_ for girls in pajamas?”

Alex turned around in her chair and raised her eyebrows.

“Sorry! I’m sorry. It’s too easy,” Kara said, trying to hold in a laugh. “I never get to bug you about stuff like this. I’m just making up for lost time.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re having fun -- at my expense -- but I do really need to finish doing this.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll stop. For now.”

Alex just rolled her eyes and went back to work. J’onn had her gathering evidence from their last Op and Alex was currently trying to remove a bullet from some dead alien’s arm to put under a microscope. If they could find the make of the bullet and what gun it supposed to go in, alien or not, then they could hopefully catch the aliens buying the guns.

Kara managed to stay silent for a couple minutes, but just when Alex had found a tool that she thought would be able to pry the bullet loose, the door to the lab opened. Alex glanced over and when she saw that it was just James coming to see Kara, she went back to work.

“Hey, you,” Kara said. “What you doing here?”

“I came to see you. Hi, Alex.”

Alex grumbled a response and started to try to pull the bullet out of the alien’s rock hard flesh using her fingers when the tool didn’t work, to no avail.

“Just ignore her, she’s concentrating.”

Then, Kara whispered something in his ear and James’ deep laugh filled the room. Alex didn’t know and didn’t care what it was, but then James said, “I heard you got yourself a date.”

Apparently, he wasn’t going to ignore her. And of course Kara told him about it. Of course she did. Alex just wondered how much she’d told him. 

“Yup,” she said, not looking up.

“That’s great. Kara mentioned something about her being a delivery girl _and_ a cop?”

Alex nodded, switching tools to scrape off some more of the flesh around the bullet. The bullet was still stuck on something, and Alex was becoming increasingly frustrated trying to detach it. And it didn’t help that people were trying to talk to her.

“Cop-In-Training, actually,” she managed to say, gritting her teeth as she stuck another tool under the bullet, trying to pry it loose. Again, it didn’t budge, but Alex was able to keep her cool until…

“Oh, well, I’m sure she has the body for it, right?”

A flush creeped up Alex’s neck and she hit her hand against the table, careful not to do it too hard lest any equipment fall off, as she stood up.

“That’s _it._ Both of you, _out._ Out, out, out,” she ordered, pointing a finger at both of them.

Kara and James were trying not to laugh and bumping into each other as they backed away towards the door when Alex advanced on them. At least James had enough common sense to look a little scared.

Kara opened the door with a giggle and an, “I’m sorry, Alex!”

James turned back to Alex, “She told me to say that.”

“I don’t care,” Alex said, shaking her head and pushing on James’ chest as they both stumbled out of the lab. 

When she had gotten them out, she was about to close the door but decided to call them back. She loved Kara, but sometimes payback was necessary.

“Hey, James.”

James turned around, Kara’s hand in his, “Yeah?”

Alex crossed her arms and leaned against the door frame, trying to keep a smile off her face as she nodded once in Kara’s direction. “You know, your girlfriend thinks she has a nice body, too.”

“What?” James said, furrowing his eyebrows and glancing at Kara.

Kara’s eyes widened and she clenched her jaw, “ _What?_ ”

Alex knew Kara was trying to tell her to shut up, but she ignored her. “Oh, did she not mention that? Well, I seem to remember her being _very_ fixated on Maggie when she came with the pizza. Something about, oh, I don’t know, ‘I have a boyfriend, but _damn.’_ ”

Kara’s mouth dropped open and James looked between them.

Alex just smiled and gave Kara a tiny wave, “Have fun!”

Then she shut the door and locked it from the inside. _That oughta give me some peace and quiet for a while,_ she thought.

Alex let out a huff and sat back down at the work table, trying to refocus on her task. She put new gloves on and grabbed the scraper again.

All was blissfully silent, and Alex once again stuck a tool under the bullet, wiggling it and biting her tongue to concentrate. 

“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon…” she mumbled to herself.

Just then, her phone buzzed loudly on the table next to her, rattling the tools. Alex jumped in her seat and accidentally successfully dislodged the bullet. It flew in the air, landing somewhere on the floor.

“Shit,” Alex muttered, putting the tool down and dropping to her knees. Luckily, she didn’t have to crawl around on the floor for very long until she found it and placed it back up on the table.

She grunted as she pulled herself back up and took off her gloves to pick up her phone.

Alex smiled despite her bad mood when she saw that it was a text from Maggie. Alex had texted her earlier about where they were going on Friday, and she had finally responded.

 **_(2:22) Maggie: what if I don’t like surprises?_**

Alex had decided not to tell her where they were going, not because she didn’t know, but because Maggie had specifically requested a ‘great date’ and, as she texted back,

 **_(2:23) Alex: great dates always have surprises, so you’re going to have to get over it :)_**

Alex sat back down on her chair, and didn’t have to wait very long for a response.

**_(2:24) Maggie: wow, where is the blubbery mess I was talking to three days ago? ;)_**

**_(2:24) Alex: ugh pleaseee no more jokes about that today_ **

**_(2:24) Alex: I have had enough from my sister…and her bf_ **

**_(2:24) Maggie: :) fine. are you at least going to tell me what I’m supposed to wear to this surprise date?_ **

**_(2:25) Alex: comfortable clothes_ **

**_(2:25) Maggie: like pajamas? ;)_ **

**_(2:26) Alex: …ohmygod_ **

**_(2:26) Maggie: im kidding, im kidding, you kinda set yourself up for that one though…sorry :)_ **

**_(2:26) Maggie: anyway, comfy clothes. I guessing that means no dresses…so jeans are ok?_ **

**_(2:27) Alex: yeah. wait so do you actually not like surprises bc I can tell you where we’re going if u really dont_ **

**_(2:27) Maggie: nooo no don’t tell me I love surprises_ **

**_(2:27) Alex: okay :) noted_ **

**_(2:28) Maggie: you’re kind of scaring me :/_ **

**_(2:28) Maggie: …what are you planning, alex danvers??_**

\--------------------------  
\--------------------------

To say Alex was nervous was an understatement. As she stood in front of the door to Maggie’s apartment on Friday evening, pacing and shifting her weight between her feet back and forth, back and forth, she was thinking of all the ways this could go wrong. How she could mess it up, how the date wouldn’t be great enough, and how Maggie would realize that she was way out of Alex’s league.

Maggie _had_ asked her on a date while she was wearing pajamas (and not even what she thought were her cute pajamas), but that could’ve changed. It had been almost a week since they’d spoken face to face and Alex could remember _that_ conversation with perfect clarity, even though she really wished she couldn’t. 

Maggie had done most of the talking, and Alex had fumbled her way through, what was it…three complete sentences and about a dozen incomplete ones? But now, since they had been texting pretty much all week, hopefully that had changed Maggie’s opinion of her slightly on that front. And Alex was determined not to be so flustered around her again.

She took a deep breath and rubbed the tips of her thumb and pointer fingers together, which she tended to do subconsciously when she was nervous or antsy about something.

Maggie had done this six days ago: stood in front of someone’s door, knew that whoever was on the other side was expecting something (that something being a cute delivery girl), and had still knocked. 

Alex could do this. No sweat, right? She’d gone on dates before, this was just another date. But, she thought, somehow this didn’t seem like just another date. For whatever reason, this was…different, and Alex couldn’t figure out why. It was driving her crazy, but what else was new?

Before she could change her mind and run away, Alex looked down at her watch, convinced herself that three minutes was more than enough time to have waited and worried, and finally knocked on the door, her heartbeat immediately quickening as she did so. 

It didn’t take long before she heard a muffled, “Sorry, just one second! I promise I was ready in time, I just… _shit_ …hold on…”

Alex smiled and wondered what was happening inside. But before she could reassure Maggie that they were in no rush, a door opened behind her.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” She heard a gruff voice say, and spun around to see a bald man who looked to be in his forties standing in the doorframe of the apartment across from Maggie’s with his arms crossed.

His eyes were narrowed and he was staring at Alex like she should not be standing there, under any circumstances.

“Me?” Alex asked, pointing to herself as if there was anyone else in the empty hallway he could be talking to. Who the hell was this guy? And why did he care if Alex was at Maggie’s door?

He nodded once, “Yeah, you. What the hell are you doing?”

Alex looked at him incredulously and shifted slightly to assume a subtle defensive stance. This guy did not look very nice, and she was trying to figure out what was going on while wondering if she was going to have to defend herself.

“I’m--” she stopped herself. Did she owe him an explanation? Maybe if she just told him he’d go back inside. “I’m here to… Wait, who even are you?”

Suddenly _Maggie’s_ door opened, and Alex almost breathed a sigh of relief.

Maggie was shrugging a leather jacket on, saying, “Hey, sorry I’m--” before she noticed that Alex, who had turned halfway around to face Maggie while still keeping whoever the hell Maggie’s neighbor was in her line of sight, was not alone, “…late. Hey, Vick,” she said casually, adjusting her jacket with a small smile on her face.

Alex didn’t get a chance to tell Maggie how good she looked in her leather jacket and tight dark blue jeans before the guy -- Vick -- spoke again.

“Hey, Sawyer. This chick--” he dipped his head in Alex’s direction “--has been standing outside your door for five minutes. Just standing there, not doing anything. Do you know her?”

Alex felt her face flush. Between her sister, James, and this guy, she was beginning to think everyone was just out to make her look bad. This was not happening. What even _was_ happening? Why was he telling her this?

Maggie looked at Alex, a smile forming on her face, and Alex jumped to defend herself before Maggie could answer his question.

She turned to Maggie, “It was not five minutes! It was…more or less three-ish minutes,” and then she turned back to Vick and asked, “Were you watching me or something?” 

Alex was becoming more annoyed by the second that this guy was making her look like some weirdo standing outside of Maggie’s door with no purpose whatsoever. 

Vick scoffed, “Uh, yeah. Through the peephole.”

“Oh, right, through the peephole, of course,” Alex said sarcastically, throwing a hand up. “Why the hell were you--”

She felt Maggie grab her wrist and she stopped talking at the contact. Alex looked down at Maggie’s hand as she squeezed once and let go, giving Alex a reassuring smile as she turned to her neighbor.

“Vick, I know her. We’re going on a date, and she’s here to pick me up. She’s the um…you know, the Girl-Alex.” Maggie looked a little embarrassed about that, which Alex was sure she wasn’t capable of until now, and avoided Alex’s eyes.

Alex just looked at Maggie curiously. She was the “Girl-Alex,” which meant that Maggie had talked to this guy about her and referred to her as the “Girl-Alex,” whatever that meant, and Alex could barely keep in a smile about it.

Vick softened his stance, but looked Alex up and down -- not really like he was checking her out, per say, but more…examining her. Alex suddenly felt self-conscious, but trusted that Maggie knew this guy, and it seemed pretty well, and that nothing bad was going to happen. Except that apparently he wanted to embarrass Alex even more in front of her, which Alex had already done a great job of already.

Vick looked confused and said, “The Girl-Alex…who-- Oh, oh oh oh!” His eyes widened and he smiled, “That makes sense. The Girl-Alex, yeah. I was wondering when you were gonna come by. It’s very nice to meet you,” he held out a hand and Alex hesitated a second before she shook it and nodded. The change in demeanor was quick, to put it simply, but Alex didn’t mind. He looked much less threatening now.

“It’s um…nice to meet you, too, I guess,” Alex said, still trying to wrap her head around what had happened, but didn’t say anything more.

Maggie reached back to latch the door of her apartment, saying, “Alright, great, so…she’s fine, you’re fine, we’re all fine here.” And then she put her hand on Alex’s elbow softly, guiding her away from Vick and down the hall. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Vick.”

“Yeah, see you Sawyer. Don’t be late.”

Maggie gave him a two finger salute, “I won’t, promise.”

Alex let Maggie guide her down the hall for a couple of seconds in silence until they both heard Vick close his door, and then Maggie seemed to relax a bit and let go of Alex’s elbow.

She immediately turned to Alex, still walking, and said, “I’m so sorry about that. Vick, he’s…well, he’s my boss.”

“Your boss?” Alex asked, immediately regretting raising her voice at him. And even though she had about a million more questions, she knew she had the rest of the evening to ask them. One thing at a time.

“Yeah, my boss at Stilton’s, not the police academy. He’s nice, but he’s also a little…”

“Creepy?” Alex suggested, a smile on her face.

Maggie laughed and opened the door to the stairwell. “Yeah. I don’t know why he was watching you or whatever he was doing…he can be protective sometimes. And paranoid.”

Alex was glad Maggie was skipping over the whole ‘standing outside of her door for far too long’ part, and decided she’d best keep her off that subject for as long as possible. “Do you know him well? I mean, are you guys friends?”

Maggie sighed and stuck her hands in her pockets. “Kind of. He’s my boss, so we can’t really be that good of friends. But he’s also my neighbor, which means I see him every day anyway, even when he’s not at Stilton’s.” She looked at Alex, giving her a once-over, “You look nice, by the way. Didn’t get a chance to mention that before…you know.”

Alex willed her face not to become beet red as she looked down at her own clothes. She was wearing a dark green long-sleeve blouse she had painstakingly picked out after about an hour of rummaging through her closet. 

She looked back at Maggie as they stepped outside, “So do you. I like the leather jacket.” Saying she _liked_ it was an understatement, but…

Maggie smiled, “So, where’s your car?”

Alex bit her lip and smiled smugly, “I thought we could walk.”

“Walk?” Maggie asked as she stopped walking, and Alex took another step before she realized Maggie was just standing there. 

“Yeah, c’mon, it’s not far,” Alex said, holding her hand out behind her for Maggie to take. She wasn’t sure why she was feeling so confident right now, but they had slipped into a comfortable conversation and Alex found herself really, really wanting to hold Maggie’s hand. Maggie looked at her hand for a second, and back up at Alex before she slowly linked their fingers together and started walking next to Alex again with a small smile.

“Where and what is ‘it,’ exactly?”

Alex clicked her tongue, trying to resist the urge to look down at their intertwined hands, “Can’t tell you that. It’s a surprise, remember?”

Maggie’s hand fit perfectly and felt so warm and soft in hers that she didn’t care that it was probably too early on to have wanted to hold her hand. They had been texting a lot over the past few days about random, seemingly unimportant things, but Alex loved it. Maggie revealed a lot more about herself than she probably knew she did and Alex was able to pick up on some pretty interesting things.

For example, Maggie liked to use emojis -- which was adorable -- and she always, _always_ replied to Alex’s texts, even if it was really late at night when she would finally get back to her. Alex, on the other hand, was horrible at replying because Kara would always text her multiple (read: many) times in a row when she was excited about something -- which was all the time. So, Alex would just wait until she was done and thus didn’t check her phone very often when it buzzed.

Besides the enjoyment Alex got out of just texting Maggie, she couldn’t help but think that there was something about her, and about being with her, that felt different. Alex hadn’t gone on a lot of dates with women, but she still knew different when she felt it. Despite the fact that she didn’t really have a knack for completing sentences around her, it was still easy to talk to her somehow. 

That was part of it, but the other part of Alex thought it was just…a feeling. A feeling that the two of them meeting was a product of very small chances that all happened to combine in exactly the right way to bring them together. But she didn’t allow herself to believe _that_ for very long, because it was kind of stupid to believe in fate. Science, facts, and figures were what Alex believed in, but she couldn’t shake that feeling, that weird, but good feeling about Maggie.

“Yeah I know, I was just trying to see if you would slip up and tell me,” Maggie said, smirking. Alex shook herself out of her reverie.

“Mmm yeah, not going to happen. I know slip-ups are kind of my specialty, especially around you. But…this date has to be great, as you specifically requested, so it has to have some suspense built in,” Alex said semi-jokingly. On the inside, she was desperately hoping that what she had planned was enough. It wasn’t even _that_ special, but in Alex’s defense, she didn’t have much to work with.

“Good, ‘cause I have _really_ high expectations.”

Alex couldn’t help a worried look as it crossed her face. She felt Maggie squeeze her hand and looked at her to see a soft smile on her face and Alex relaxed a little bit.

“I’m completely kidding, Alex. I have a normal amount of expectations; I was just being a little ass the first time we met when I said that, you know. You don’t have to…do anything special for me.”

Alex furrowed her eyebrows. Why wouldn’t she do something special for their first date? Did Maggie think she didn’t…deserve a great date? Who the hell wasn’t taking her on great dates? 

Maggie was wearing her hair down again, and it bounced slightly as they walked. Alex focused on it, because Maggie wasn’t looking at her, while she was thinking about what Maggie had just said. 

Maybe the problem wasn’t that Maggie didn’t think she deserved a great date…maybe it was that she didn’t think Alex could plan one. She didn’t have high expectations because she didn’t want to get her hopes up.

Or maybe it was both of those things.

“So…you’re saying you don’t have high expectations for this date?” Alex said carefully.

Maggie looked back at her curiously and, after a second, she realized what Alex was implying. 

“No! No, that’s not at all what I meant,” she said quickly. “I have no doubt that wherever we’re going will be great, and that we’re going to have fun, I just…” she trailed off.

“Just what?” Alex asked, trying to get her to continue. She was relieved that maybe she was wrong about her second idea, but that just meant that her initial thought was probably true, and she wasn’t sure whether that was worse or better.

Maggie shrugged, “I just…like going on dates -- they don’t need to be special. I meant that you don’t need to make it special just for me. I want to hang out with you because you’re interesting, I like you, and I want to get you know you better. So, I’m sorry if I…freaked you out by saying it needed to be a _great_ date. I didn’t mean to make you worry about planning some surprise or grand adventure or something just for me.”

Just for her.

Okay, so…Alex’s first thought _was_ true. And she hated being right, for once.

It was the fact that Maggie said it so casually, like it was no big deal, that was bothering Alex. She probably didn’t even realize what she was saying.

Alex wondered what had happened, or more likely what had _not_ happened, in the past that made Maggie think this way. The first time they met, it only took about five minutes for Alex to realize that Maggie was really something else, something great, and that she wanted to spend time with her. She hadn’t even questioned it when Maggie had requested a great date because Alex was more than ready to take her on one. Alex’s idea of a great date was to include something special, and Maggie definitely deserved something special. So…why couldn’t Maggie see that? 

Alex decided that the best way she could tell Maggie that she really deserved a great date was to _show_ her and hopefully give her one, so she was going to let it go, sort of, for now. 

“You know, technically _you_ asked _me_ out. I mean, you asked yourself out, for me. So, I’m not sure why I’m planning this great date for you when really, you should be planning it for yourself,” Alex said, smirking. She said a silent thanks to Kara for not letting that part of the whole thing go and smugly reminding her about it way too often.

Maggie finally looked back at her and laughed, “Yeah, I was going to let you get away with that and not bring it up, but now that you mention it…I did, didn’t I?”

“Unfortunately, yes, you did. So, where are you taking yourself?

Maggie tapped her chin, “Hmm…I don’t know. I have a feeling that _you_ could think of a great place, though. Could you recommend something?”

“I’m not telling you where we’re going.”

“…Dammit.”

They kept walking for a while, just talking. Alex was worried that the place was farther than she originally thought, and almost passed it when she realized they were there.

“Oh, we’re here.”

She stopped abruptly and Maggie, still holding onto her hand, stopped as well. Alex let go of her to go open the door of the building right in front of them.

“This is…a dance studio. Or, I guess it used to be,” Maggie said, not going inside when Alex held open the door for her. “Are we going dancing?”

The building looked pretty old and run down, and Alex realized that it didn’t look like a very nice place, which was probably why Maggie was skeptical about going inside. Alex was also relieved that Maggie didn’t know what this place actually was, despite the fact that it was so close to her apartment.

“No, no we’re not going dancing. I’m a terrible dancer, I would never do that to myself, or you. There’s a restaurant downstairs called the Underground, it’s been here for years.”

Alex had only been here once before when she was little; she and her mom had stumbled upon it on one of those rare nights when they had been out together. There was no sign for it anywhere on the outside and you had to know to go down the stairs.

“Really?” Maggie said, and she did indeed look surprised. Score one for Alex, but she still had something else planned after this, so she just hoped she’d be able to get two for two.

Despite the curiosity written over Maggie’s face, she also looked nervous that Alex was leading her to an underground restaurant in an abandoned building that she had no idea existed before today. Which did sound suspicious, Alex had to give her that.

“Yeah, I swear. I know this looks bad, like I’m leading you into certain death or whatever, but I promise if you just come downstairs you’ll see.”

Maggie looked like she desperately wanted to believe her, and just then a couple, arm in arm, came up the stairs and walked out, thanking Alex for holding the door open for them.

Alex smiled what she hoped was a reassuring smile, “See?”

Maggie pursed her lips and, after a couple of seconds, slowly started walking towards the door.

“I’ll go in first, if you want,” Alex offered.

“Yeah, okay.”

Alex went in and Maggie followed her, the door shutting behind them. She gave Maggie another glance -- she still looked pretty unsure and tensed up about this whole thing -- as she started walking down the stairs. 

The soft jazz music that was playing was getting louder as they descended the stairs, and then the restaurant unfolded in front of them as they reached the bottom. It wasn’t a very big space, but there were a good number of tables filled and an area for the live band. They had mood lighting and the whole place was decorated with antique lamps on every table, but it was still a lowkey, casual restaurant. Not too fancy, which Alex liked, just in case.

Alex heard a soft, “Woah,” from behind her and turned to see Maggie paused on the bottom step, her eyes wide.

Alex smiled at Maggie’s wonderment. As she slowly stepped off the last step, looking around, Alex asked, “So, what do you think?”

Maggie shook her head a bit like she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing, “This is sick. Like prohibition-era speakeasy hideout sick. How did I not know this existed?”

Alex shrugged. “I mean, no one does, really. Hold on, I’m going to get us a table.”

She went over to the desk and the lady looked at her screen for a second before ushering Alex to follow her. Maggie didn’t notice, so Alex grabbed her hand again and pulled her gently after her as she followed the hostess.

As they weaved around tables, Maggie was able to follow them while still looking around at the artwork on the walls like a kid in a zoo for the first time, which Alex found adorable.

The hostess held out her hand with a smile to a small table for two and pulled out Maggie’s chair for her before Alex could. Then, she left them with menus in peace. Alex scooted her chair in as Maggie took off her jacket.

“This is, what, five blocks from my place? I’ve lived in that apartment for almost a year and I never even…How did you know this place was here?” Maggie said, finally looking at Alex again.

“A long time ago, my mom and I came here once. I was about…I don’t know, seven or something? And I had accidentally rolled this little ball I was playing with through the open front door of the building and went chasing after it. My mom came after me and we heard jazz music from down the stairs, so we decided to check it out.”

“But that was…twenty years ago, right? How did you know it was still here?”

Alex shrugged. “I didn’t. I made sure it was though, before I brought you. I mean, how embarrassing would that have been if it wasn’t?”

Maggie let out a laugh, “Yeah, you could’ve just been taking me to the basement of an abandoned building. Not creepy or anything.” She winked and Alex smiled, glad that Maggie was feeling more comfortable about this whole thing and that she had picked a good place.

“So…I guess I successfully managed to surprise you.”

Maggie just looked at her for a second with a look that Alex couldn’t quite read and then said, “Yeah, you did. Most definitely surprised.”

\--------------------------

Alex was almost done with her dessert, but Maggie was an extremely slow eater. It probably didn’t help that they were talking about everything and nothing the entire time they were eating, but Alex willed herself to eat slower so Maggie wouldn’t feel rushed. Actually, Maggie probably ate at a regular pace, but Alex wouldn’t know that because Kara had always eaten stuff off of Alex’s plate if she didn’t eat fast enough. So it was either eat fast or not eat at all.

They had just finished talking about their jobs, which Alex couldn’t really talk a lot about, before Alex remembered to ask Maggie about something that had been bothering her for a while.

“So, what was that whole thing with Vick about…me being “Girl-Alex”?”

Maggie swallowed a bite of her cake and looked confused for a second before she remembered and her eyes widened a little bit. “Oh, uh…it’s not…it’s nothing important,” she said, looking down at her cake and picking at it with her fork.

Alex looked at her, amused that she was clearly embarrassed by this, even if it didn’t seem like it was a particularly bad thing.

“When you say stuff like that, it just makes me want to know even more, you know.”

“I promise it’s nothing bad.”

Alex waited for her to continue, but she didn’t.

“Maggie.”

Maggie lifted her head slowly and pursed her lips. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”

Alex smiled and shook her head.

She sighed and put down her fork, leaned back slightly in her chair. “Alright, fine. I guess I’ll just start with…I’ll just tell you the whole story, why not?” She smiled but it seemed forced. “So…last Saturday night when you had, you know…had ordered your order and wrote that note requesting the cute delivery girl, I showed Vick because I…thought it was funny. He read it and he knew it was my turn to go deliver, but he didn’t want me to go because he thought that whoever…wrote that would be, you know, a douchebag.”

“Right…”

“I mean, not that you were, obviously,” she said quickly, and then continued, “But, he was expecting some horny guy and he didn’t want me to go. I didn’t really want to deal with some horny guy either, but I kind of thought it would be fun just to see who wrote it. And I could obviously defend myself if necessary. I tried to argue that maybe it was a woman, but the problem with that, though, was that the name on the order was _Alex._ So…I couldn’t really argue with Vick about it too much because it was probably, most likely, a guy. I did also try to say that I was the cutest delivery girl and sending anyone else would not be completing the order correctly, but he didn’t buy that,” she said with a small laugh. “Anyway, and then…” she bit her lip, “I got another idea…because Vick…well…he um…”

“What?” Alex asked, having a feeling they were getting to the good part.

Maggie paused to let out a breath and then said, “Well, he’s a very strong believer in, um…fate, and all that stuff.”

“Fate,” Alex repeated. Because even though Maggie had just said it, Alex couldn’t quite believe it. Vick, of all people?

“Yeah, so…” she cleared her throat, “I knew that, I mean, everyone knows that. So, I figured the only way I could get him to let me go was to argue that if fate was on my side, Alex – you – would be a woman, and I really couldn’t pass this up because…what if you were?”

“Oh, my god,” Alex said, trying not to laugh.

“I know, I know. I was telling him all this crap about fate, and how I hadn’t dated in a while, and how I had to take advantage of this very small opportunity and chance that you might be a woman.”

“And I was,” Alex said, wondering where exactly the nickname came into this.

Maggie nodded, “And you _were,_ which surprised me because I was really not expecting it at all, despite having spent ten minutes telling Vick that I desperately hoped you would be. And so…Vick knows you as Girl-Alex because when I got back, of course he demanded I tell him what happened. When I did, he was so surprised and excited that apparently fate had worked out in my favor. He started calling you Girl-Alex and going on and on about ‘what are the chances’ and ‘fate works in mysterious ways’ and crap like that.”

Alex was silent for a second, just soaking this all in, and finally she said, “Wow.”

Maggie bit her lip, “Yeah.”

“That’s…” she laughed, “Sorry, I’m not laughing, I’m just…”

“It’s okay, you can laugh. It _is_ funny,” Maggie said as she started to laugh as well.

“Vick really believes in fate? The guy I met outside your apartment? _That_ Vick?” Alex asked after she had caught her breath.

Maggie nodded and took a sip of her wine. “Big time.”

“I just…I can’t see it.”

“Yeah…I mean, he’s a big softie once you get to know him. He’s just a very intimidating-looking guy who happens to believe in soulmates and fate.”

Alex couldn’t stop smiling about it. “He sounds like my sister.”

“Oh right, the sister that wrote the note,” Maggie said, smirking and starting to eat again.

Alex looked at her curiously, “Yeah…wait, why did you say _I_ wrote the note earlier? I did tell you my sister wrote it.”

“Mmhm,” Maggie said skeptically, her mouth full of food.

“I…I didn’t write the note.”

“Mm,” Maggie started picking at her food again, a corner of her mouth quirking up.

“My sister thought I needed to start dating again and did it while I wasn’t in the room,” Alex stated, even though she knew that Maggie was just teasing her about this.

Maggie swallowed. “Alright, whatever you say,” she said, amused that Alex was defending herself against something so arbitrary.

Alex opened her mouth to continue, but decided against it and instead said, “You know, I’m really glad she did.”

Maggie looked back up from her food, a soft smile on her face, “Yeah, me too.”

Alex bit her lip and then put her napkin on the table. “I’m going to go to the bathroom really quick, but when I get back I have about a million more questions about Vick…and you, I guess.”

Maggie rolled her eyes and nodded, going back to her cake when she noticed how little Alex had left on her plate compared to how much she had.

Alex got up and looked over her shoulder once at Maggie as she walked away, then focused on finding the bathroom.

Once she was done and drying her hands, thinking about how she wanted to ask Maggie more about her brothers and sisters she’d briefly mentioned earlier, her phone rang in her pocket.

Alex threw the towel away, wondering who was calling her because she’d told Kara not to call her unless it was an emergency. Which meant that…this was probably an emergency, or it was work. Or, more likely, both.

Alex fished her phone out of her back pocket and her heart dropped when she saw “DEO” on the screen.

“Shit,” she whispered under her breath.

 _Shit, shit, shit._ This could not be happening now. This was going so well, why was this happening to her? Maybe she wouldn’t have to leave, but that seemed unlikely given her job description and duties.

She squeezed her eyes shut and answered the call before it rang out. “Danvers.”

“Alex.” It was J’onn. “We got the results back on the gun that held those bullets you were examining earlier this week. The alien group that buys those guns has a shipment coming into the dock on the South side, tonight. We need agents there to intercept it and deal with them.”

Alex rubbed the tips of her fingers on her temple and then together as she began pacing around the bathroom.

This was utter, complete shit. She was going to have to leave. She was going to have to leave Maggie in the middle of their date. Their first date that had been going so well.

Alex had been stood up before. In fact, her first date with a woman she had been stood up, and she remembered very clearly how that felt. She was about to do that, or at least a version of that, to Maggie. Who was so pretty and nice and funny and who she liked so much.

She groaned. Sometimes, and it was very rarely, she found that she didn’t really like the unreliableness of her job. This was one of those times.

“Alex?”

Alex took a deep breath, knowing that she didn’t have much time. But she had to ask. “J’onn, do you need me there?”

Alex asked because J’onn knew that when she asked him that, she was really telling him that right then, she didn’t want to come for a reason, a very good reason. She had only asked him that twice before, and she knew J’onn would very seriously consider whether he really needed Alex, specifically, there or not.

A few seconds of silence, and then, “I can give you about five minutes, but yes. I’m sorry, Alex.”

Alex took a deep breath. That was all she needed to hear. “Okay. I’ll…I’ll be there.” This was going to be…she was going to hate doing this, but she had to.

“Do you have a vehicle or do you need your sister to come pick you up?”

Oh crap, her motorcycle was by Maggie’s apartment. She didn’t really feel like running back to get it. “Send Kara. Tell her I’m at…the only abandoned building on 54th street. I’m not really sure what the address is.”

J’onn didn’t ask her to elaborate, and only said, “Got it. I won’t send her over right away, but I’ll try to give you as much time as possible. I’ll see you there, Alex,” he told her before he hung up.

Alex slowly brought her phone down and put it back in her pocket. She rubbed her hands over her face, wondering how she was going to tell Maggie that she had to leave to go deal with these damn aliens before the door to the bathroom opened.

Alex turned and saw Maggie standing there with a small smile on her face, “Hey, sorry, I was just wondering where you were. You were in here for awhile. And I…kind of also have to go to the bathroom.”

She stepped into the bathroom and Alex was trying to think of what to say to her. Now that she was here, and she looked so…beautiful, Alex didn’t know how she was going to be able to do this.

Then, Maggie noticed the look on Alex’s face and walked over to her, grabbing her arm, “Hey, what’s wrong? Is everything okay?”

“Yes. I mean, no. No, it’s…not.” Alex shook her head and ran a hand through her hair. _Rip off the band aid, Alex, you don’t have much time,_ a small voice in her head reminded her. “I…I have to leave. For work.”

“Oh,” Maggie said softly, and Alex looked up from the floor at her. The look on her face was exactly how Alex had imagined it would be, and it made her even more angry and depressed about this whole situation. Then, Maggie somehow managed a small smile, “Well, that’s okay. I mean, we were almost done with dessert anyway.”

Alex shook her head, “No, no, it’s not okay. I had something else…If you wanted to, we were gonna go…” she sighed. “I guess it doesn’t matter now.”

Maggie squeezed her arm. “Where were we going to go?” She asked quietly, reaching up to brush a lock of hair back from Alex’s face and behind her ear.

Alex took a deep breath and willed her voice not to shake, “Paintballing.”

Maggie’s dimples appeared as she smiled, “Paintballing?”

“Yeah,” Alex laughed a little bit, despite the situation, “It doesn’t sound like such a good idea, now. But…the only thing I knew about you was that you were a pizza delivery girl and a cop, more importantly, and I figured you’d be good at it and we’d have fun.”

“Oh, _that’s_ why you didn’t want me to wear a dress. So, you wanted us to shoot at each other on our first date?”

Alex laughed and looked down at her shoes. “Oh, my god. That was a horrible idea, wasn’t it?”

Maggie squeezed her arm and tilted her chin back up with her finger, “No, it wasn’t. I love paintball, actually. I would’ve loved shooting at you.”

“I’m…not sure if that’s a good thing.”

Maggie smiled and then pursed her lips. “So…”

Alex looked at her for a second before she realized that she did have to leave, and probably now. She groaned, “This was supposed to be a great date.”

“It was a great date, Alex.”

“But, no, you…you deserved a great date and this was just dinner, and walking. I mean, this wasn’t…enough. I didn’t even drive you over here. I made you walk.”

Maggie shrugged, “I like walking. Believe me, if I didn’t, I’d have made you drive me.”

“Yeah, but--”

“Alex,” Maggie said sternly, taking both her hands in her own, “I’m trying to tell you that this was a great date, because it was. It doesn’t matter where we go or where we were going to go. Hanging out with you, and getting to know you, was enough for me. This, I mean, the restaurant and everything, was…more than enough for me. But since you aren’t listening to me…and because this date unfortunately has to end now…tell me how you think a great date would end.”

Alex looked at her, wondering what she was trying to do or what she wanted Alex to say. “I don’t…I don’t know.”

“Okay,” she said, licking her bottom lip and smiling. She let go of Alex’s hands. “I don’t really want to do this in the bathroom, but I have a feeling we don’t have much time left before you leave… So, can I tell you how _I_ think a great date would end? Can I show you?”

Alex nodded numbly while her brain was trying to figure out what was happening. Why did it matter that they were in the bathroom?

“Yeah, I gues--”

But she was cut off by Maggie pulling her jaw down and firmly pressing her lips to hers, which caused Alex to suck in a surprised gasp.

It took a second for her brain to catch up with what was happening, but when it did, Alex gripped Maggie’s arm and kissed her back.

She couldn’t quite…believe it. She felt Maggie’s hands on her jaw, on her neck, and she tasted her lips -- which tasted like wine and chocolate cake -- with her own, but she still couldn’t quite…comprehend that it was happening.

As much as she didn’t want to, and she _really_ didn’t want to, she stopped kissing Maggie and Maggie slowly leaned back, her eyes fluttering open.

“So…you’re saying this was a great date. That’s what I…got…from that.”

Maggie shook her head and bit her lip, trying not to smile, “Yes, obviously, you dork.”

Alex let out a tiny relieved breath and smiled. She tucked a lock of Maggie’s hair behind her ear and was about to kiss her again when they heard gasps from outside of the bathroom.

Alex furrowed her eyebrows and stepped slowly around Maggie as she, too, turned towards the sound.

Alex was about to get really worried because the band stopped playing and she heard chairs scooting back, but then:

“Alex! Hi, sorry, I’m looking for a woman named Alex. Alex, are you here?”

Kara. She was here to get Alex, because Alex had to leave. Now, apparently.

Alex slowly opened the bathroom door and saw Kara standing in the middle of the restaurant _as Supergirl_ looking around. Everyone in the restaurant was staring at her in awe.

“Supergirl, I’m over here,” she said loud enough for Kara to hear. Kara turned and looked relieved when she saw her sister and started walking over to her.

“Hey, sorry, we gotta go.”

Everyone in the restaurant slowly got back to what they were doing and the music started up again.

“I know, I’m coming. I just--” She turned around but bumped into Maggie, who was standing right beside her. Maggie was staring at Kara and then glanced at Alex.

“You know Supergirl?” She whispered, and Alex smiled.

“Um, yeah. We work together.”

Maggie just looked back and forth between them incredulously and suddenly found her voice again. “ _You work with--_ Mm, you know what? You can tell me later.”

Alex felt her heart leap at the prospect of “later,” and she turned away from her sister and kissed Maggie on the cheek. “I’m sorry about this, really I--”

Maggie pressed her lips together and shook her head. “No more about that. Please leave before I have to kiss you again to shut you up.”

Alex could only imagine the look on Kara’s face right now, so she just whispered, “Okay,” to Maggie and turned back to her sister. Kara definitely looked like she wanted to say something -- a lot of things -- to Alex at that moment, but she knew they had to leave.

“C’mon,” she said, taking Alex’s arm and pulling her through the restaurant.

Alex turned back around just once to look at Maggie to see her shaking her head in disbelief. Alex smiled and turned the corner to hop up the stairs behind her sister. Once they had gotten outside, Alex barely got a grip on Kara before she shot up into the air and flew towards the South side of the city.

Kara wasn’t saying anything, but Alex knew she wanted to.

“Kara?” She said softly, knowing that her sister could hear her despite the wind whipping by them.

“Yeah?”

Alex smiled and hugged her sister a bit tighter, “Thank you.”

She could see the corner of Kara’s mouth turn up. “You’re welcome, Alex. Took you long enough.”

Alex smiled and slapped her shoulder, “Shut up.” She was able to just enjoy being in the air with the wind and the thrill of flying, until her phone buzzed.

Alex awkwardly got her phone out of her pocket, being extra careful not to drop it, and clicked it on. 

**_(8:03) Maggie: you know, Alex, I'm starting to think you're just using me for my money ;)_**

Alex furrowed her eyebrows. What was Maggie talking about? What did she mean by-- 

"Oh, _shit."_

"What? What's wrong?" Kara asked. 

"I...I didn't pay." 

" _...Again?_ "

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ....... :)
> 
> fun fact: the original ending to this chapter was that alex was not going to have time to say goodbye and was going to have to go to the pizza place to win maggie back, but then I decided that a) it was gonna be a really long chapter if I did that, and b) alex deserves happiness, and she always has to leave so I was like "you know what, she deserves five minutes and happiness" :)


	3. Part III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex has some stuff to work out before she can take the next step with Maggie......

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a 3-4 week jump from chapter 2 (after the beginning italics part)

_Alex kneeled down to inspect the alien she had just flipped over her shoulder and slammed onto the concrete._

_She had cracked its skull and it was definitely dead. Alex hopped up and scanned the room, then she put a hand to her earpiece and gave the all-clear._

_The other agents, J’onn, and Kara gathered around three large wooden shipment boxes full of alien weapons. Everyone stepped back as Kara and J’onn pried each open to make sure nothing would explode in their faces. Once they made sure that it was just guns in the boxes, J’onn waved Alex over and she unslung her own gun from her shoulder, holding it in her hand and swinging it a bit like it weighed nothing at all._

_“We need to get these back to headquarters and somehow destroy them. Maybe keep one or two to examine,” J’onn said._

_It took four agents to each box, with J’onn handling the third on his own, to load them in the DEO’s vans. Kara wanted to take one of the boxes herself, but Alex held her back._

_“Kara, I need you to do something for me,” Alex said, starting to unclip her guns and leading Kara by the arm to one of the vans._

_“Okay…” Kara said suspiciously._

_“I need you to go check on Maggie.”_

_Both of them stopped walking as they reached the van, not yet going inside of it._

_“What?”_

_Alex let go of Kara and ran a hand through her hair. She cringed as she said, “She had to walk home. Tonight, after our date.”_

_Kara just looked at her for a second, then asked, “Seriously? She walked home alone tonight? From your first date?”_

_“Yeah,” Alex said softly. Kara was about to start talking again but Alex explained, “We walked to the restaurant and my motorcycle is at her apartment building. I just want to make sure she got back safe.”_

_Kara looked up like she was trying to figure something out. “I’m confused. So,” she started listing points off on her fingers, “you didn’t pay for the pizza the first time you met, you didn’t pay for the first date either even though you were supposed to, you had to leave before the date - your first date - was even over, and then she walked home - from your first date - alone.”_

_Alex pursed her lips. “Basically, yeah.”_

_Kara smiled and shook her head. She was about to say something but then an agent who had apparently been overhearing their conversation walked by, smiling, and asked, “Why does she like you?”_

_Alex let out a laugh and said, “I really don’t know, actually. I’m so bad at this.”_

_But Kara punched the agent’s arm on his way into the van and Alex was pretty sure he was going to feel that one for a while. Kara continued glaring at him until Alex got her attention again._

_“Please, Kara, can you go check on her? I know her apartment number.”_

_Kara looked back at Alex and crossed her arms. “You should text her.”_

_“I did. She said she was fine and at home safe.”_

_“Then why do I need to check on her? And why can’t you do it?”_

_Alex shrugged, “Because…well, anyone can text from a phone. I mean, she could be kidnapped or something right now and they could have her phone -- before you say anything, I know it’s crazy to think that, but there is a small possibility. And, I can’t do it because she already thinks that I’m a mess, that I am the literal worst probably, and I don’t want her to think that I’m crazy, too. If I show up at her doorstep asking if she got home safe, she’s going to think that I’m creepy or that…you know, I want to come in or something.”_

_“…Do you?”_

_Alex hit Kara on the arm and hissed, “This was our first date, Kara.”_

_Kara pouted and rubbed her arm, even though they both knew that it didn’t really hurt her. “Sorry, sorry, kidding. So…you want me to go to her apartment and spy on her using my powers, without her knowing, to make sure she’s actually there.”_

_Alex nodded._

_“You are definitely crazy, and she’s going to figure that out at some point.”_

_Alex sighed, “I know, but I want to hold off on that for as long as possible. So, will you? Please? Just fly up and look in her window or through her wall for a second or something. Don’t go in the apartment building though, her neighbor is kind of weird.”_

_Kara rubbed a hand over her face. “Fine, fine.”_

_Alex beamed and hugged her sister quickly when she heard J’onn calling her. “Thank you. I just want to make sure she’s okay. And I owe you, big time.” She hopped into the van, setting down her guns._

_Kara scoffed, “Yeah, you do.”_

_Kara was about to take off but then Alex leaned back out of the van before they slid the doors closed, “Oh, and can you get my motorcycle, too?”_

_Kara turned around, “Alex--”_

_“Please?” Alex said, pouting. Kara rolled her eyes after a second and nodded, taking off into the air before Alex could ask her to do anything else._

_Alex smiled and slid the door shut. The van started to drive away from the dock and, after texting Kara Maggie’s apartment number, Alex held her phone tightly in both hands, waiting for Kara to text her back._

_The other agents were talking and discussing the Op, but Alex wasn’t paying attention. She knew that Maggie was probably at home safe, but how could she be completely sure? And it was the least she could do after all she had done…or, actually, hadn’t done, as Kara had pointed out._

_It was a long ten minutes before Alex got a text back._

_**Kara: sorry, it’s hard to know which apartment from the outside. she’s fine, she’s just on the couch reading** _

_**Kara: you’re lucky she wasn’t in the shower or something bc that would’ve been awkward** _

_Alex let out a sigh of relief. She ignored Kara’s second comment and found herself smiling at the fact that Maggie liked to read. She’d have to store that to ask her about later._

_**Alex: thank you <333** _

_**Kara: yeah, yeah :P** _

_**Alex: did you happen to see what book** _

_**Kara: omg I am NOT going back to see what she was reading** _

_**Alex: …fine** _

_**Kara: soooo if your motorcycle gets a little scratched up on the way back over, you won’t get mad at me right?** _

_**Alex: um yes?? I definitely will** _

_**Kara: don’t worry, im kidding… (kind of) :)** _

\-----------------------------  
\-----------------------------

There was a bell that dinged obnoxiously on the door to the ice cream shop when Alex pushed it open and held it for Maggie.

Maggie walked out and when Alex followed her, only then did she realize just how late it was. She turned her wrist to look at her watch, and realized that she should be tired and ready to sleep by now, but she wasn’t yet.

It was nearing the end of the night and the end of their fourth date, and Alex was kind of nervous about what might happen at the end of this date. According to many of the websites Alex would never admit to looking at, four was _the_ magic number of dates. Or was it five? Alex couldn’t remember.

But before her brain could spiral into a worried-frenzy about it, Maggie took her hand, anchoring her to earth, and started walking down the street in the direction of her apartment.

“You’re not a _real estate_ agent, right?” Maggie asked, smiling up at her.

Alex laughed. “What? No.”

“If you’re not going to tell me what kind of agent you are, I’ll just have to keep guessing, you know.”

“Well, your guesses are getting more and more ridiculous, so maybe I’ll never tell you. Just to see what you can come up with.”

Maggie smirked and looked Alex up and down, nodding. “I can see it.”

Alex furrowed her eyebrows. “See what?” 

“You, as a real estate agent.”

“Oh my god.”

“Just imagine: Alex Danvers, National City’s top-ranked realtor. That house--” Maggie pointed to a random apartment building in front of them “--looks like such a steal. You should try to sell it to me.”

Alex squinted. The lamps on the street lit up the darkness in front of them just enough that Alex could say, “That’s not even a house,” to Maggie with confidence.

“See?” Maggie said, bumping her shoulder. “This is why you’d be good at it. You should think about switching careers.”

Alex smirked and shook her head in amusement. “If knowing the difference between an apartment building and a house is enough to be a real estate agent, then anyone could do it. Except you, apparently.”

“Ooh, ouch,” Maggie said, pouting.

Alex squeezed her hand. “I kind of wish I was a real estate agent now. It would be much less stressful.”

 _And involve way less death,_ she added mentally. 

“What’s on your business card, then?”

“What?” Alex asked.

“Your business card. Does it say, ‘Alex Danvers: Kind of a Doctor, Some Sort of Agent, Won’t Tell You, Even If You Have Dimples’?”

Alex laughed again and kissed Maggie’s cheek. “You’re lucky you’re cute, you know. And I’m sorry I can’t tell you, my boss is very adamant about it. Otherwise I would, in a heartbeat.”

Maggie smiled at her, “I know. It’s just too much fun to bug you about it. It actually kind of makes you mysterious, which I like.”

Alex looked at her as she raised her eyebrows suggestively, and Alex smirked back. 

Maggie turned her attention away when they rounded a corner. “Would you rather I stopped though? I mean, I don’t want you to feel bad about not being able to tell me.”

“No, no. It’s fine.”

Maggie looked back up at her with a worried expression, “Are you sure?”

Alex nodded and said, “Yeah, I want to hear what other careers you have planned for me. Just in case I have a mid-life crisis before I reach thirty.”

Alex was actually afraid of what would happen when Maggie _didn’t_ joke around about it anymore and was bothered by Alex not telling her. For now, though, Maggie seemed more than happy to be dating someone mysterious, apparently. Alex tried to recall how Jeanine felt about not knowing what she did, and she couldn’t remember Jeanine ever really joking about it or anything.

It didn’t take long before they reached Maggie’s building and Alex started to get nervous again. Of course, Alex had told Maggie about the past six, rounding on seven now, months for her, and she knew that Maggie had been out and proud since she was pretty young. So she definitely had a lot more experience than Alex did. Alex remembered how she had asked Jeanine if they could wait to have sex and Jeanine had been more than happy to oblige. She wondered if Maggie would react the same way; she had a strong feeling she would, but she still couldn’t stop the butterflies in her stomach.

Alex also remembered not regretting waiting, and although it was definitely different this time with Maggie, she still found herself wanting to wait.

Alex had dropped Maggie off at her door on their second date -- a date Alex had actually remembered to pay for -- and now she was here again. 

“Maybe you could tell me…what shoes you wear to work.”

Alex looked at Maggie inquisitively as they started walking down her hallway, “Why does it matter what shoes I wear?”

Maggie shrugged and looked down to unzip her purse and get her keys out. “I don’t know. If you give me an unimportant detail, maybe it’ll make the actual important details seem more intriguing.”

Alex furrowed her eyebrows. “That doesn’t really make sense. But…” Maggie looked back up at her and stuffed her keys in her back pocket. “…maybe I can tell you what color my…I guess it’s a uniform, is.”

A harmless detail, in Alex’s opinion. She really couldn’t think of any way that telling her this would be bad. Plus, she was fairly certain Maggie actually thought she was some kind of undercover government agent already, which she kind of was, and a lot of them wore similar uniforms anyway. So, she still wouldn’t figure out that Alex was specifically DEO, or about the DEO in general, which was what J’onn cared about.

Maggie’s eyes widened and she smiled a little bit. “That’s better than the shoe thing. Do tell.”

“Alright. It’s um, black. All black.”

Maggie stopped them and let go of Alex’s hand when they reached her door. “All black? Head to toe?”

“Head to toe,” Alex repeated, nodding.

Maggie’s smirk grew and she scanned her eyes up and down Alex’s body. She wasn’t saying anything, and Alex worried that maybe that hadn’t been a good thing to tell her. Maybe she was figuring it out already, somehow, from that.

“What?”

Maggie looked back up at Alex and licked her lip. “Nothing. Just uh, imagining it.”

Alex felt her face flush a bit. “Oh.” _Ohhh,_ she thought. _That makes more sense._

Maggie smiled and pulled Alex down by her jacket but didn’t kiss her. Instead, she brought her lips to Alex’s ear and whispered, “I think I would really, really like to see you in all black.”

“Yeah?” Alex asked softly, and she couldn’t help a smile as it crossed her face. It took all her self-control not to shiver at Maggie’s breath in her ear.

Maggie brought her head back a bit so she was looking at her. Then, she bit her lip and nodded, bringing Alex down again to kiss her, open-mouthed, this time.

Alex swallowed a noise that itched to escape her throat and gripped Maggie’s wrist, responding with enough enthusiasm to push Maggie so her back hit the door, even though she hadn’t really meant to.

This was definitely different than almost all the other times they had kissed before. After their third date, Alex had invited Maggie into her apartment strictly to watch a movie, but they had ended up making out on the couch. Some hands may have gone under some shirts, but that was as far as they had gotten.

Alex forgot about everything except kissing Maggie, and Maggie’s hands that had made their way up to her hair, and then she felt Maggie’s right hand disappear. Alex didn’t think anything of it until she heard a soft but distinct jingle and realized that Maggie was trying to get her keys out her back pocket to unlock the door, and Alex’s eyebrows shot up.

Alex broke away abruptly and opened her eyes; Maggie did the same. Alex looked at the ground and took a tiny step back and a second to catch her breath.

She ran a hand through her hair, looking back up at Maggie, who just seemed a bit worried. Alex sighed and started talking before she could say anything.

“I’m sorry, Maggie. I just…” Alex took a deep breath, “I want to wait. If that’s okay.”

She watched Maggie’s face for any signs of disappointment or anger, but didn’t find any. 

Instead, Maggie smiled and nodded, and actually looked a little relieved that that was the reason Alex had pulled back. “Of course, Alex.”

Alex let out a breath, “Really? You’re okay with that?”

Maggie just looked at her incredulously and took both her hands in hers, “Yes, yeah, of course. And _don’t_ apologize, Alex, seriously. It’s not a big deal. Actually, you know, I should apologize. I was going to check when we got inside but I should’ve asked you first, if you wanted to come in in the first place. I was just…kind of caught up in the moment, I guess. I’m sorry,” she said with a small smile.

Alex mirrored her smile, “Yeah, so was I. And…and it’s not you at all, Maggie, and it’s not like I _never_ want to, it’s just--”

Maggie silenced her with a tiny peck on the mouth and nodded. She brushed back some of Alex’s hair that had fallen out from behind her ear and said, “I get it. I completely get it, Alex. You should be a hundred percent ready, and in the meantime, please don’t worry about it. Or me, okay?”

“Okay,” Alex said softly. She was deliriously happy and felt like a huge weight was being let off her chest.

Alex leaned down and kissed Maggie. When she pulled back, Maggie was smiling.

“I’ll text you, tomorrow,” Maggie said.

Alex knew Maggie was telling her that because she was still probably worried that Alex thought she wouldn’t want to continue dating her, and Alex wondered when Maggie had begun to know her so well. 

Alex adjusted her purse on her shoulder with a small smile. “Okay. Goodnight, Maggie.”

“’Night, Alex.”

Alex took a few steps backward before she turned around. When she was almost down the hall, she glanced over her shoulder but Maggie had already gone into her apartment.

The next morning, Alex woke up to a text from Maggie, as promised, and one from J’onn saying she needed to come in to work. She wasn’t too happy about it because it was a Saturday, but she was also glad she hadn’t stayed over at Maggie’s last night because she would’ve had to leave.

After replying to the message from J’onn, she opened Maggie’s.

 _**Maggie: insurance agent? ;)**_

Alex couldn’t help but smile and sat up in bed.

 _**Alex: ooh so close**_

She got up and started to get dressed and ready to go to work, when Maggie texted her back.

_**Maggie: really??**_

_**Alex: getting colder actually** _

_**Maggie: damn :( one of these days, I swear**_

Alex was about to respond to that one before Maggie sent another text.

_**Maggie: I have an idea for our next date**_

_**Alex: I’m listening…** _

_**Maggie: I can’t tell you actually, it’s a surprise** _

_**Alex: …but what if I don’t like surprises? :)** _

_**Maggie: well this is a good surprise, I promise** _

_**Maggie: and, as a wise woman once told me, “get over it” ;)**_

\-----------------------------  
\-----------------------------

“So, how’s it going with Maggie?” Kara asked the next day before she grabbed a pot sticker and stuffed it into her mouth.

Alex felt the couch give a little as Kara sat down next to her. They were trying to figure out which movie to watch, even though it was the middle of the day on a Sunday. Alex was so pleased to have the whole Sunday off that she suggested they watch multiple movies in celebration, which Kara had been more than happy to agree to.

Alex put down the DVD she was inspecting and leaned back against the couch.

“Good. Really good,” she replied.

“Yeah, I can tell. What’s that? A smile?” Kara asked, leaning over and poking Alex’s cheek. “I didn’t know you could smile.”

Alex shooed her hand away but couldn’t stop smiling, which Kara thought was way too funny. Kara then picked up the top DVD Alex had just put down and flipped it over, reading the summary on the back.

“Are you two like…exclusive?” She asked after a few seconds of silence, and put the DVD down to pick up another one.

Alex pursed her lips. “Um…I’m not sure, actually.”

Kara looked up at her, “You’re not sure?”

“Well,” Alex said, sighing, “I mean, it kind of seems like we are but…and I want to be, but I don’t know if it’s been long enough.”

“You’ve been seeing her for what, four weeks, right?” Kara asked, placing the DVD back on the table and turning to face Alex.

Alex nodded.

“Okay…I know it took James and I like a year but that was way different. It’s different for everybody. If you want to be, and she feels the same, then you should just…go for it, I think.”

Alex ran a hand through her hair. “But how am I supposed to know if she feels the same?”

Kara shrugged and smiled a bit, “Well you could, y’know, ask her.”

“Yeah, I could. You know, she did -- I mean she does -- want to h--…” Alex said before she realized that she was talking to Kara, her _sister,_ and stopped herself. “Nevermind.”

Kara squeezed Alex’s wrist, “What? What does she want to do?”

Alex just looked at her sister, who seemed genuinely curious and really couldn’t seem to figure out the end of that sentence. It kind of amused Alex, and she wondered if this was how oblivious _she_ was all the time.

Kara kept looking at her and Alex decided to give her some slack. Besides, who was she going to talk about this with, if not with her sister? They were so close anyway, and plus, Alex wanted to see the expression on Kara’s face when she answered her question.

Alex tried not to smile as she said, “Um, me?”

Kara furrowed her eyebrows. “She wants to d-- _Oh._ ” Her eyes widened and she had a slightly disturbed look on her face as she let go of Alex’s wrist, “Oh my god.” She put her face in her hands and mumbled, “Oh _my god,_ Alex, I did _not_ need to know that.”

Alex just snickered and dodged a pillow Kara threw at her. “I’m sorry! I had to see your reaction. It was definitely worth it.”

Kara just shook her head and glared at Alex. “I do not _ever_ need to know any details about that.”

Alex just pursed her lips as she tried not to smile. Kara grabbed another pot sticker and decided to start talking again, but had to repeat herself when Alex couldn’t understand a word she said.

Kara must’ve known that Alex kind of wanted to talk about it with somebody, because she swallowed and said, “I asked, ‘Did you end up, you know…?’”

“Oh,” Alex said, looking down and picking at the fabric on the couch. “Uh, no. I told her I wanted to wait.”

“And what’d she say?” Kara said, her voice lower. Alex thought she was probably preparing to go have a talk with Maggie if she had said the wrong thing.

“She said she was fine with it. More than fine, actually.”

Kara smiled. “Good. Otherwise, you know I would’ve--”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. It’s fine, we’re good. But…” Alex took a deep breath, “there is something. Wrong. I mean, I think I…keep sort of comparing her to…Jeanine.”

Kara furrowed her eyebrows, “Why?”

“I don’t know,” Alex said with a sigh. “I mean, I know I shouldn’t and it’s bad that I am sometimes, but I just…I’ve only been in one real relationship that I count as a relationship. So, it’s kind of hard _not_ to, you know?”

Kara pursed her lips. “Not really. But Alex, it’s different with Maggie, right? I mean, she’s not Jeanine.”

Alex put her head in her hands. “I know. I know she’s not, believe me.” She looked up again, “I mean, it was good with Jeanine, and we ended on okay terms. At least I think we did ‘cause I don’t really know why she broke up with me. But with Maggie, it’s great, like all the time. I remember sometimes with Jeanine it wasn’t as--”

“Wait,” Kara said, putting up a hand. Alex stopped talking and Kara looked at her curiously. “You don’t know why Jeanine broke up with you?”

“Um…no, not really.”

Kara put her hand down and crossed her legs up onto the couch. “But…you told me she said it wasn’t working out.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, what else did she say?”

Alex shrugged. “That’s…that was it.”

Kara was silent for a second before she said, “That was it? That’s all she told you?”

“Yeah. She said something along the lines of ‘it wasn’t working out,’ and then…I kind of just…left.”

Kara looked at her incredulously. “You left? You never told me…you only told me she said it wasn’t working out and I assumed she explained why. I couldn’t get anything else out of you ‘cause you would just start crying.”

“Well yeah, that’s sort of what happened, actually. I…I thought I was going to start crying when she started telling me it wasn’t going to work out, so I made up an excuse and left. Because I didn’t want her to see me cry.”

As Alex was telling Kara all of this, she realized just how weird it was. It had been awhile since she thought about how Jeanine never did tell her exactly why she dumped her. Not that Alex had given her the chance to, really.

“Doesn’t it…bother you? I mean, don’t you want to know why?”

Alex pursed her lips. “I don’t know. It doesn’t really bother me _that_ much…I did think about it sometimes, but I haven’t for a while. Why does it matter now, anyway? I’m happy with Maggie and Jeanine’s probably happier, too, so…”

“But I think you have a right to know. She was probably going to tell you, if you hadn’t run out. And I’m kind of surprised you didn’t fight for her, actually,” Kara said, a small smile on her face. “You’re pretty stubborn.”

“Yeah, well…I didn’t really know how to handle it. I mean, I haven’t really had…” she took a deep breath, “a chance to be able to handle things like that.”

“That’s true. You should still call her or something though, and ask her.”

Alex looked at Kara. “Am I even allowed to do that?”

Kara smiled, “It’s not like there are official dating rules that say you can’t, Alex. I think you’re still thinking about Jeanine because you didn’t really get closure or whatever.”

Alex sat on the couch in silence, thinking it over. Did she want to know? The first couple weeks after they had broken up Alex had wondered about it all the time, but she had kind of pushed it aside in an effort to get over her. And it had worked. Not perfectly, but it had still worked.

Maybe Kara was right. Alex was pretty sure she was completely over Jeanine already, but maybe doing this would make sure of it.

She was pretty convinced that she wouldn’t have thought about it again if Kara hadn’t brought it up. But now that she had, Alex was sure it was going to start bothering her again.

“But what if it’s bad? Like really bad?” Alex finally asked.

Kara grabbed her hand and squeezed it, “It won’t be bad. I’m sure you did nothing wrong, Alex. If you had done something terrible, Jeanine probably would’ve been a bit more mad at you when she broke up with you, right?”

“Yeah,” Alex sighed, “I guess. I don’t know, Kara…this seems weird.”

“I think you’ll feel a lot better if you do this, Alex. But I’m not going to force you to, and if you’re not comfortable doing it, then don’t. You should at least think about it, though.”

Alex pursed her lips and picked up a DVD, “Maybe…tomorrow. If it’s still bothering me.”

Kara just nodded and got up to put the DVD in the player and sank back down on the couch. Alex crossed her arms and put her feet up on the coffee table. She didn’t pay attention to the entire movie.

\-----------------------------  
\-----------------------------

Alex was going to do it.

She paced the length of her apartment, holding her phone in her hand. She had just gotten back from work and was angry at herself for thinking all day about what she and Kara had talked about the day before. Alex supposed it would be good to just…do it. Because obviously it was still bothering her and it was going to _keep_ bothering her, so she should get it over with.

But then again, Alex wasn’t sure what Jeanine would think about Alex calling her. Maybe she wouldn’t even pick up, and Alex would have to live her entire life never knowing why Jeanine broke up with her.

Alex stopped and stared at her phone. She opened up her contacts and scrolled down to Jeanine’s contact but didn’t tap it.

She chewed her lip and looked at it a bit longer, pacing again. Finally, she sat down on the couch and hit Jeanine’s number before she realized what she had done.

 _Well, too late to go back out now, I guess_ , Alex thought, her heart hammering against her chest. She pursed her lips and brought the phone to her ear, silently pleading that Jeanine wouldn’t pick up.

It took five rings, and Alex was about to be relieved that Jeanine wasn’t going to answer before she heard, “Hello?”

Alex was silent for a second. It was definitely her. Alex swallowed before she said, “Hey, Jeanine. It’s um, Alex.”

“…Yeah, I saw. What’s…what’s up? How are you?”

Alex took a deep breath. “I’m good, how about you?”

“I’m doing pretty good. Sorry, I’m not trying to…be rude or anything but, why are you calling me?”

Alex pressed the hand that wasn’t holding the phone against her forehead and closed her eyes. “I’m not calling ‘cause I want to get back together or anything, I just…um, well…I actually had something I wanted to ask you.”

It was silent for a second before she heard, “Okay…”

Alex had been a little worried before that talking to Jeanine would maybe stir up old feelings or something, but she found, surprisingly, that she didn’t feel anything for her anymore. Maybe she _was_ completely over her and this phone call wasn’t necessary. But it was a little too late to back out now.

So Alex took a deep breath and spit it out before she could change her mind, because she still wanted to know. “Why did you break up with me?”

“What?” Jeanine asked after a few more seconds of silence. Alex didn’t get a chance to answer before she continued, “Alex…it’s…it’s been two months.”

“I know. I just um…you never told me why, exactly, you did. And it’s been…bothering me, I guess.”

“Well, I never told you because you didn’t really give me the chance to. You kind of--”

“Bolted. I know. I’m so sorry about that, I really shouldn’t have just left like that. But I want to know, now.”

She heard Jeanine let out a breath on the other side of the phone. “I was going to tell you, you know. I was going to explain. But um…I guess I don’t see any reason why telling you now is different. I mean, it _is_ different, but…”

Alex just sat in silence and sank a little more into the couch, waiting for her to continue.

Jeanine took a deep breath, and finally, she continued. “I had this friend. I mean, she’s still my fr-- well not really just a friend but…anyway. I had this friend. I think you may have met her once. Her name’s Katherine. She um…well, we were friends for years and I kind of liked her, like a lot.”

“Uh huh…” Alex said when Jeanine paused so she knew she was still listening.

“And I never did anything about it because I was sure she didn’t like me like that. Well…turns out…” Jeanine let out a breath, “…she did. By that time though -- when she told me -- I was…with you. I don’t know why she told me then, but she did. And I didn’t…pursue her. Because I was with you and I thought I was over her.”

“But you weren’t,” Alex guessed.

“Yeah. I…wasn’t. I mean, as soon as I figured that out I knew I had to…you know, break up with you because it wouldn’t have been fair to you at all. So I did.”

Alex laid down on the couch and closed her eyes. She almost let out a relieved laugh.

“I know this is a cliché, Alex, but…it really wasn’t you. It was me.” This time Alex let out a little laugh and Jeanine continued, “I did like you a lot. It was just…”

Alex nodded but realized that Jeanine couldn’t see that, so she said, “Yeah, no I…I understand. Are you um, happy? With her?”

She could hear a smile in Jeanine’s voice, “Yeah, yeah I am.”

Alex couldn’t help a smile. “Good. That’s good. I’m glad.”

“…Sooo…we’re okay?”

Alex was nodding again and put her fist to her forehead when she realized, again, that Jeanine couldn’t see that. “Yeah, we’re good. Thank you, for telling me. I’m sorry for calling out of the blue…and for running out like that.”

“It’s okay, I mean I wish you hadn’t but…anyway. So, how’s everything? How’s Kara?”

“She’s fine. She’s still--”

“Oh, you know what? I’m sorry, Alex, sorry I just…my mom’s calling the other line. You remember my mom, right? She’s…I-I have to go.”

Alex stood up and started to head to the kitchen. She remembered Jeanine’s mom, not that she had ever met her, but the stories Jeanine would tell about her were…interesting. So she just said, “Oh, okay. I guess I’ll…see you around?”

“Yeah, yeah. Sorry, my mom is just--” she laughed, “She’s going to yell at me if I don’t pick up. Bye Alex, I’ll…I’ll see you around.”

“Okay…bye,” Alex said, the last part to herself because Jeanine had already hung up.

Alex pursed her lips and put her phone in her pocket. She opened the fridge and pulled out leftover takeout and grabbed a fork, not even bothering to heat it up. Then she sat back down on the couch, trying to process that whole conversation while she ate.

She couldn’t keep a small smile off her face. It wasn’t her. She hadn’t done anything wrong, surprisingly. It kind of sucked but…Jeanine was happy with Katherine. Alex vaguely remembered meeting someone named Katherine but was sure that she wouldn’t be able to pick her out of a crowd. 

It didn’t matter, anyway. Alex was happy she’d called and asked. Besides actually knowing the real reason she was dumped, Alex was also sure that she was completely over Jeanine. Which was great because now she wouldn’t wonder about it.

And…it also made Alex realize that she should really stop pushing aside and forcing herself not to think of things that were bothering her. Even if it was just a little thing that she was sure _wasn’t_ supposed to bother her, now, and that could be solved in a matter of minutes. Which meant that she had another person to talk to…

\-----------------------------  
\-----------------------------

Friday nights had become Alex and Maggie’s date nights because it was basically the only time both of them were off work. Alex usually had the weekends off, too, but she almost always got called in for half days. Maggie didn’t mind much because she was basically working two jobs and didn’t have much time off either.

Alex was currently pulling clothes out of her closet and putting them on the bed. She had about five laid out right now and wasn’t sure which one to pick for their date that night. Finally, she chose the fourth dress the left and slipped it on. Alex hung up the rest, ran a hand through her hair, and then started to pace around the apartment, cleaning random things in an effort to waste time.

And that’s when she heard a soft knock on the door.

Alex stopped pacing and slowly turned around. She looked at her watch. If that was Maggie, she was five minutes early. Maggie was never early.

Alex walked to the door and looked through the peephole. She could tell it was Maggie even though her back was to the door. And she wasn’t dressed as nice as Alex was. Alex frowned as she distinctly remembered Maggie telling her she could wear a dress.

Alex opened the door and Maggie turned around, her face lighting up in a smile. She was wearing jeans. Nice jeans, but still…jeans.

“Hey,” she said, kissing Alex, “You look great.”

“Oh, um, thanks,” Alex said. She held onto the door and put a hand on her hip. “You’re early. And you’re wearing jeans. I mean, not that they don’t look good but…”

Maggie looked down and laughed a little bit, “Oh yeah, well…there’s a reason. And I am early. For once.”

“Is that the surprise?” Alex asked with a smile.

Maggie rolled her eyes, “No, that is not the surprise. I actually thought that…well…can I come in and tell you?” Alex’s eyes must have widened because Maggie grabbed her hand, “I don’t want to come in for…to, you know, I just…um, I want to make you food. Dinner. That’s…that’s the surprise.”

Alex raised her eyebrows. “You want to make me dinner?”

Maggie smiled and nodded. She bent down and picked up two grocery bags full of stuff that Alex hadn’t noticed before and Alex became even more confused.

This was what girlfriends did, right? People who were casually dating did not cook for each other. This was…Alex didn’t really know for sure, but this was definitely what girlfriends did, in her mind.

“Last time I was over here, on our third date, I noticed that you didn’t have anything in your cupboards. Or your fridge. And I figured you probably order takeout and pizza a lot so…I know how to cook and…I thought I could actually cook you, us, a real meal.” Maggie paused. “So you could eat good food, for once.”

Alex smiled. “Um, okay. I mean, I’m not gonna say no to food.”

Maggie beamed and asked, “So, can I come in?” Alex nodded and Maggie didn’t let her take the grocery bags as she made her way to the kitchen. She hoisted the bags up onto the counter and started digging through them wordlessly, pulling out various ingredients.

Alex didn’t quite know what to do so she just stood on the other side of the counter and leaned her arms on it. Maggie looked at her and gave her a smile before going back to work.

“I didn’t know what you had already, so I assumed you didn’t have anything and bought everything I needed.”

“That…was very smart. So um, what are you making?”

Maggie crouched down and moved things around in her cupboard and popped back up holding a pot that Alex couldn’t even remember she owned. Then, she took a box out of one of the grocery bags and simply said, “Pasta.”

“Pasta?”

“Yup,” Maggie said, continuing to cook. “It’s really good, the way I make it, trust me.”

“However it turns out, it’ll be better than anything I could ever make, ever, so it won’t be very hard to impress me.”

Maggie just smirked as she filled up the pot with water and concentrated on cooking. Alex just watched and had to admit she was kind of mesmerized by the way Maggie moved around her kitchen as she cooked. It seemed like cooking was second nature to her, especially when she started to do multiple things at once and had two pots going while switching between grating cheese and chopping things into a bowl.

Alex tried to help and offered to grate the cheese but Maggie said she’d probably cut off her finger somehow, and Alex had to reluctantly agree with that.

Then, it was silent for about ten minutes while Maggie cooked and Alex instead started to clear off her tiny kitchen table.

“You know, my mom is asking about you.”

Alex finished smoothing out the table cloth and straightened back up. Maggie looked over her shoulder while stirring and then turned back.

“Yeah?” Alex asked.

Maggie nodded and Alex walked back to the counter. “She wants to know who I’m dating all the time, and she got kind of excited when I finally mentioned someone. You.”

Alex leaned against the counter and smiled to herself because Maggie wasn’t looking at her. She was trying not to get too excited about Maggie saying “someone.” Singular. And about the fact that she told her mom about her.

“Are you saying nice things about me?”

“I’m trying, it’s very hard,” Maggie said, looking back over her shoulder again and winking. “I’m kidding, Alex. I am, don’t worry. She um…she does want to know, though…what you do. For your job. She’s been kind of hounding me about it.”

Alex frowned. “Oh.”

“I’ve been dodging her questions pretty successfully, but…”

“Yeah, no…that makes sense.” She looked at the back of Maggie’s head as she stirred the sauce and decided to take a leap with what she was going to say next. Alex swallowed and took a deep breath, “Maybe you could um…tell her that…that your girlfriend is a Secret Service agent. If you want.”

Maggie stopped stirring and turned around.

“Girlfriend?” She said softly.

Alex nodded and crossed her arms around her stomach. “If…if you want to.”

A smile slowly grew on Maggie’s face as she walked over to Alex and unwrapped her arms from her stomach one hand at a time and held each hand in her own.

“Yeah, I want to.”

Alex smiled and leaned down to kiss her and Maggie met her halfway. Alex felt Maggie squeeze her hands gently and Alex could not remember ever being happier than she was in this moment.

Maggie pulled back after a few seconds and furrowed her eyebrows, “Wait, Secret Service agent?”

“Uh, yeah. I’m not a Secret Service agent, but that’s what I usually tell people.”

Maggie just looked more confused. “I asked you, when we met, if you were a Secret Service agent.” Alex nodded and Maggie continued, “You said you couldn’t tell me if you were or not.”

“Well…I didn’t want to lie to you.”

Maggie slowly let go of her hands to go check on the sauce. She turned off the stove and said, “But you had just met me. Why would it have mattered?”

Alex shrugged as Maggie, who was keeping most of her attention on Alex, finished grating the cheese. “I don’t know. Maybe I had a feeling that you were going to stick around for a while.”

Maggie smiled and bit her lip. “Now _that_ …was a good line. You’re getting better at this.” Before Alex could answer, Maggie asked, “Can you get us some forks? I’m basically done.”

Alex turned and got forks out, and before they sat down to eat, Alex turned on music because she told Maggie that she was sure her food was restaurant material (it was), and thus, to make this feel like a restaurant, they had to have music in the background.

The whole time they were eating, Alex was having a hard time not thinking about the fact that Maggie was her girlfriend, now. Officially. And that _she_ had actually asked, and that Maggie had said yes, and that she could call Maggie her girlfriend. 

All week, Alex had also thought about what had happened last Friday night outside of Maggie’s apartment. And how she was pretty sure that her reaction to Maggie wanting to have sex with her was mostly because she had been comparing their relationship with her and Jeanine’s relationship, and how fast the internet said relationships were supposed to progress. Which she was definitely not doing anymore, because it was so much different with Maggie. And no amount of statistics and research findings could tell her how she felt about Maggie, how she was supposed to feel, or what she wanted. 

And Alex also thought about how she was probably more ready that night than she thought she was, but she was so worried about doing everything right that she didn’t really know how much she had wanted to.

Despite all that, though, a small part of Alex’s mind still wondered about something. Even though she knew it probably shouldn’t bother her, now. But she wanted to ask Maggie about it before she lost her nerve.

“Can you make me food like, all the time?” Alex asked, taking her last bite of the pasta. “I’m serious,” she added when Maggie smirked.

“You could always _learn_ how to cook, you know.”

Alex made a disgusted face and Maggie laughed. 

Alex then got up to put her plate in the sink and, with her back turned to Maggie, she was brave enough to say, “Can I ask you a question?”

She heard Maggie scrape her fork on her plate and then she said, “Sure.”

Alex rinsed off the plate but didn’t wash it and started walking slowly back to the table. “I was wondering why you asked me out.”

“…That’s not a question. And…what do you mean?”

Alex sat back down at the table and Maggie had put her fork down. “I mean…why did you ask me out? The first time, when we met?”

“What?” Maggie asked, putting her hands in her lap.

“Why did you--”

“No, I heard you, I’m just…confused.”

Alex sighed. “Well…it didn’t, it still doesn’t really…make sense to me, I guess.”

Maggie crossed her arms and leaned back in the chair. “It doesn’t make sense to you.”

“Not really. I mean,” she started fidgeting with the table cloth and couldn’t seem to look Maggie in the eye, “I was so awkward and _such_ a mess. I couldn’t even complete sentences and I can probably count the number of words I said to you. And I was just wondering if you…did it because you…” she took a deep breath and ran a hand through her hair, “…felt bad for me or something.”

“Wha--…Wait. You…you think I wanted to go on a date with you because I felt bad for you?” Alex nodded the tiniest bit and Maggie just looked confused. “Who would ask someone out because they felt bad for them?”

“I did. Once.”

Maggie’s eyes widened. “You did?”

“Um yeah, well, kind of. In sophomore year of high school…this guy that everyone hated asked me out and I felt really bad for him so…I said yes. And it was not the best date,” she said with a little laugh, “but, yeah, I sort of did.”

Maggie was silent for a while and Alex was wondering whether this was really not a good thing to have asked her. But it was bothering Alex and she didn’t want it to anymore, and she genuinely wanted to know.

“So, do you think I also kissed you because I felt bad for you? Do you think I’m _with_ you because I feel bad for you?”

Alex shook her head, “No, no…it’s just…the first time…I can’t figure out why you asked me out the first time.”

“Um, okay,” Maggie finally said after a few more seconds of silence. “Well, first of all, I did not feel bad for you, Alex. I thought you were cute, and yeah, you were flustered, but it was probably because you weren’t expecting me, a cute girl, if I do say so myself,” she said with a wink, “who liked girls, to show up at your door. I didn’t expect you either, by the way, as you know.”

“Yeah, b--”

“ _And,_ I liked you because you were interesting and apologized for the note the second you knew that I had seen it and was going to acknowledge it. You apologized multiple times, actually. And anyone who does that cannot be a bad person.”

Alex shifted in her chair. “And that was enough?”

Maggie smiled. “Yeah, it was. Well, mostly.”

Alex stayed quiet and waited for her to continue.

Maggie pursed her lips and uncrossed her arms. She leaned forward and rested her arms on the table. “It was all that, but it was also…it was also because you said thank you, Alex.”

Alex just looked at her. “Because I said thank you,” she repeated.

Maggie nodded and smiled. “You thanked me for the pizza.”

“Doesn’t…doesn’t everyone say thank you?” Alex asked.

Maggie’s smile turned sad as she said, “You’d be surprised how many people do not thank me when I bring them their pizza, Alex.” She paused. “The shit I go through every night, delivering pizzas…you wouldn’t believe. I mean, I know I’ve told you stories but…When I first started as a delivery girl years ago, before I even moved to National City, it didn’t take me very long to realize that I was not getting thanked for bringing people pizza very often. Which bothered me. And I know it’s my job, and that I am obligated to bring you pizza per my job description, but--”

“But that shouldn’t matter,” Alex interjected, “people should still stay thank you.”

Maggie shrugged, “Yeah, well…they don’t. So…when I realized that, I started to play this game, this sad little game, with myself and actually counted how many people did not thank me when I gave them their pizza. And you know what, Alex? I lost count.” She paused and licked her lip, “I had to stop counting, and for a long time, I was really bummed about just how many people did not thank me. I didn’t know how to just forget about it. It took me a while, but…but I realized that I should instead start counting, that I should start _noticing,_ the people who _did_ thank me. And you, Alex,” she said, pointing to her, “you did. That…that was what made me ask you on a date. I had a feeling you were just going to let me leave and I…decided I had to do something about it.” 

Alex leaned back in her chair and was silent. “Huh,” she finally said, crossing her arms.

“What?”

Alex smiled a little bit, “Well, I was just thinking…do you think saying ‘thank you’ works on everybody? I mean, just think of how many dates I could’ve gotten if I had just said thank you to people.”

Maggie shook her head and smiled, “Have I ever told you that you’re a giant dork, Alex?”

Alex got up and took Maggie’s plate, “Yeah, you may have mentioned it. But…you are now the girlfriend of the dork, so I don’t know what that says about you.”

“…That’s true.”

“Also,” Alex said as she turned the sink on, “I want to say thank you on behalf of all the jerks who don’t say it to you. At least as far as Kara and I are concerned, you, and anyone who brings us pizza, is a literal god-send.” She left that plate in the sink and turned off the water.

Maggie laughed as Alex walked back over to the table. She was about to sit down again because Maggie hadn’t gotten up yet, when Maggie said, “Ooh, I like this song.”

_…I know something now, know something now I didn’t before_

Alex had sort of tuned out the music but just looked at Maggie. “Taylor Swift? Really?”

Maggie crossed her arms. “Says the woman who has this song on her playlist.”

Alex pursed her lips and tried not to smile. “…Touché.” Maggie smirked. “Do you…want to dance?” She asked, holding her hand out.

_I just want to know you better, know you better, know you better now…_

Maggie looked at her curiously before she said, “But you told me that you’re a horrible dancer.”

“Well…yeah, about that. It’s not that I’m a _bad_ dancer, really,” Alex said as she thought back to her college days where all she did was party and dance. Because of that, it had sort of lost its appeal, now. “It’s just that I don’t like to dance.”

“Okay, let me rephrase that then: you don’t like dancing.”

Alex shrugged. “Yeah, but…I don’t think I would mind much, if it was with you.”

Maggie looked at her for a second with a soft smile on her face before she took Alex’s hand and Alex pulled her up out of the chair. She lead her over to an area where they had more space, and Maggie put Alex’s hand on her hip and linked her hands together behind Alex’s neck as Alex held onto her waist.

_‘Cause all I know is we said hello  
And your eyes look like coming home… _

They didn’t need much room to move as they mostly just shuffled back and forth and seemed to be moving to their own beat. Alex smiled at Maggie as she looked down every so often, probably to make sure she didn’t trip on Alex’s feet. The fourth time she looked back up, Alex leaned forward and kissed her, and then pressed their foreheads together.

Alex thought about telling Maggie that she was sure she was ready, one hundred percent ready, to take another step with her, but then Maggie moved closer, wrapping her arms around Alex’s neck and resting her chin over her shoulder. Alex tightened her arms around Maggie’s lower back until was sure there was no space at all between them, and she smiled as she closed her eyes, enjoying the feeling of Maggie’s body pressed against hers.

_All I know is a simple name…everything has changed…_

Alex decided that she could wait until at least the end of the song to tell her, because she didn’t really feel like moving. And if part of her dress bunched up in Maggie’s fist was any indication, she knew Maggie didn’t feel like moving, either.

And besides, at least as far as Alex was concerned, she wasn’t going anywhere, so they had all the time the world...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ......... :) hope you enjoyed 
> 
> I don't really like T.Swift but the lyrics of that song worked really well for this AU (and Sanvers in general) soooo I went with it  
> Also, this AU is not going to get smutty. It will stay T-rated, and I cannot write smut for...reasons.
> 
> Okay. So yeah. Again, hope you enjoyed, lemme know via comment or kudos or whatever if you want :)


	4. Part IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex and Maggie have been together for four months and Maggie still doesn't know that Alex is a DEO agent. But Alex is starting to get frustrated because she wants to tell Maggie how much she means to her without this secret looming over them, although maybe Maggie will beat her to it.......

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Minor note (spoilers)  
> Alex does not die. If you are worried at any time, for whatever reason ;) , while reading this chapter that Alex is going to die, I promise you, she is not. I love her way too much to do that and I would've put a warning if she was. She's fine. You'll quickly see why Alex had to get hurt, but she is not going to die. Don't worry :)
> 
> With that, enjoy......

Alex woke up with a face-full of hair.

She slowly opened her eyes, blinking away the light streaming in from the window, as she carefully unwrapped her arm from Maggie’s bare stomach. She smiled and wrinkled her nose as she brushed some of Maggie’s hair away from her face, trying not to let it tickle her.

Maggie didn’t move as Alex did all this, but Alex wasn’t surprised.

During the past four months, Maggie had been spending more and more time at Alex’s apartment. Sometimes, Alex would come home to Maggie crashed on the couch after work and would drag her to bed, or Maggie would be up and making Alex a late-night dinner. Alex had given Maggie a key already since it had been getting ridiculous how often she was over there anyway.

Alex was glad it was a Sunday morning, because she didn’t feel like getting up just yet. She breathed in the scent of Maggie’s hair and stared at her back, her fingers itching to trace the curved spine she could see through the sheet, but she knew that it would probably wake Maggie up. And she knew how Maggie was when she woke up. 

Four months ago, she never could’ve imagined waking up so happy and content after sharing a bed almost every night with someone. Everything was great and everything was working with Maggie. 

Except for the fact that there was one piece that wasn’t quite fitting into their perfect puzzle -- Maggie still didn’t know that Alex was a DEO agent, specifically. It wasn’t that Alex didn’t want to tell her, it was that she simply couldn’t. J’onn was very adamant, especially after the whole alien-President fiasco that had happened recently, about keeping the DEO under wraps for security purposes. And Maggie didn’t make the cut, not yet anyway. Alex hoped that she’d be able to tell her soon, because she was worried that Maggie, who always said she was okay with not knowing, would suddenly, one day, not be okay with it.

Maggie knew how important Alex’s job was to her, and it frustrated Alex to no end that she had to keep her work and Maggie separate. She didn’t blame J’onn, mostly, because she also knew how important it was to keep the DEO under wraps as the government was still trying to deal with aliens discreetly. 

To them, there was no reason for Maggie to know. In their books, she was a pizza delivery girl whose only connection to the DEO was that she happened to be dating one of their agents. Maggie was so close to graduating from the police academy, and Alex was wondering whether her being a cop would be enough for the DEO to get over themselves so Alex could tell her.

The sheet wrapped around Maggie left her shoulder blade bare, and Alex pressed her lips lightly against it and then untangled herself from Maggie and the sheets, pushing off the bed. She had something she wanted to do before Maggie woke up, and had a feeling it was going to take a while.

Alex pulled on the pajama pants and a t-shirt that were left by her bed the night before, as her apartment was always cold in the mornings, and shuffled out to the kitchen, still wiping sleep from her eyes.

Alex swore she would never lie to Maggie about her job, so when Maggie asked her something she couldn’t talk about, Alex simply told her that she couldn’t tell her. And Maggie would let it go, although Alex could swear that it bothered her more than she was letting on, no matter how many times Maggie told her it didn’t. And what also worried Alex was that Maggie was starting to just…not ask anymore, like she had feared would happen.

Alex got the eggs and cheese she had bought at the grocery store (an actual grocery store) out of the fridge and started cracking them on the side of a bowl. She spent the next minute getting all of the tiny shells out and then was finally able to start cooking. If what Alex did counted as _cooking,_ that is. 

“Are you…making breakfast?”

Alex turned to see Maggie coming out of the bedroom with a messy bun and wearing only a too-long red plaid t-shirt that reached her mid-thigh. No matter how many times Alex saw her in that shirt, and it was a lot, she never got used to it. Maggie had a small smile on her face, but also looked confused seeing Alex by the stove with a spatula in hand.

Alex smiled back and turned to focus on her task. “Yeah.”

“Is the world ending?”

Alex shook her head and tried not to smile, “I made breakfast that one time before, you know.”

Alex could see Maggie walking into the kitchen from the corner of her eye. “I don’t know if whatever I had then could be called food.”

“It was scrambled eggs.”

“Really?”

Alex rolled her eyes as she tried to keep a close watch on the eggs sizzling in the pan, which became difficult when she felt Maggie wrap her arms around her from behind.

“They were not that bad.”

Maggie stood on her toes and peered over Alex’s shoulder at the stove, watching as Alex sprinkled cheese onto the eggs and folded it over. “So…you couldn’t make scrambled eggs and now you think you can make an omelet? That’s supposed to be an omelet, right?”

Alex smacked one of Maggie’s hands lightly, “Yes. And it’s just eggs, cheese, and seasoning, how hard could it be? You don’t even like anything else in your omelet, so I figured I might actually be able to do this. I’m doing pretty good, so far. I think.” 

“I should go call the fire department so they’re ready, just in case. Or poison control,” Maggie said. Alex could feel her smirking as she pressed a kiss to Alex’s jaw.

“Ha, funny,” Alex deadpanned, and she almost shivered when Maggie’s fingers started to lift up her shirt. “Maggie…please don’t distract me, I need to focus on this.”

“I’m distracting you?”

“You know you are,” Alex said, and was about to continue when she felt the tips of Maggie’s ice-cold fingers on her skin. Alex clenched her stomach and sucked in, trying not to drop the spatula in her hand. “ _Holy shiiii_ …Maggie, your fingers are _freezing_.”

Maggie laughed and didn’t take her fingers away, so Alex put the spatula down and grabbed both her hands, turning around the face her. Maggie had a shit-eating grin on her face and Alex tried very hard not to smile.

“Why are your fingers so cold?” Alex asked.

“They need to be,” Maggie said like it was obvious.

“What? Why?”

“Because then you won’t flex when I do that.”

Alex looked at her for a second, and then said, “You did that so you could feel my abs?”

Maggie’s grin just got bigger, if that was possible. 

Alex let out a laugh and shook her head, “You’re ridiculous. Go sit over there so I can finish this.” She let go of one of Maggie’s hands to point to the stool at the kitchen island.

But Maggie pulled down on Alex’s other hand and kissed her, and Alex momentarily forgot about the omelet. A few seconds later, Maggie pulled back and neither of them moved, but then Maggie whispered, “You need to flip it now,” against her lips.

Alex opened her eyes again, her lips still tingling a little bit, to see Maggie’s amused expression and swatted her away. She turned back to the stove and managed to semi-successfully flip the omelet.

The stool scooted back and Alex glanced over her shoulder at Maggie, pointing the spatula at her. “You are forever confined to that chair.”

Maggie put both her elbows on the counter, resting her chin in her hands. “I don’t mind, this is a better angle anyway.”

Alex smirked and raised her eyebrows, “Are you saying I have a _bad_ angle?”

She turned back to her omelet, pushing it around the pan as she didn’t quite know what to do with it or how she would know if it was done. 

“No, I meant that…the pants look better from this angle.”

Alex nodded, “Ah, that makes sense. You know, I think Kara was right.”

“About what?”

Alex flipped the omelet over again to check the other side and glanced back at Maggie. “She seems to think you have a thing for pajama pants.”

Maggie shrugged, “Well, I have a thing for _you,_ so if you’re wearing pajama pants…then yeah, I have a thing for pajama pants.” Then Maggie glanced at the stove, “You’re going to burn it.”

Alex tore her eyes away from Maggie and turned back to her omelet, which was a little darker yellow than she intended. Then, she got a plate out and slid the omelet onto it, smiling because it actually looked pretty good, for once, but she just hoped it tasted okay.

She turned off the stove, got a fork out of the drawer, and placed the plate in front of Maggie wordlessly. Maggie looked back and forth a couple times between the omelet and Alex before she finally picked up the fork.

Alex waited impatiently on the other side of the counter as Maggie slowly cut off a small piece, blew on it, and put it in her mouth, looking at Alex as she did so. There was a flash of uncertainty, a nose scrunch, and then Maggie smiled a little bit. Or at least she looked like she was trying to.

Alex’s face fell. “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

Maggie raised her eyebrows at Alex’s face and swallowed the bite. “No, no, it’s not. It’s uh…it’s pretty good.”

But Alex groaned, “It’s just eggs and cheese, how could I have messed it up?”

Maggie reached across the counter and squeezed Alex’s wrist, “Alex, I’m telling you, it’s…good. See?” She put another bite in her mouth, and again her face scrunched up the slightest bit.

Alex stared at her, wondering why she was eating it even though it seemed like it tasted bad. Maggie smiled as she continued chewing and Alex went back to the kitchen to get another fork.

“Let me try it,” she said.

Alex turned back to Maggie as her eyes widened and she hopped off the stool, taking the omelet with her. “No! No, you don’t need to try it. Because…I…don’t want to share it with you.”

“Maggie,” Alex said, following her as she backed up and went around the island, eating a bit faster now. “Let me try some,” she repeated.

“But if _you_ eat it…then, _I_ can’t eat it…and because it’s _so good_ …” Maggie said, pausing as she looked over her shoulder to make sure she wasn’t about to run into anything while walking backwards and continuing to eat the omelet.

Alex laughed, “Why are you eating it if you don’t like it?”

“I do--” Maggie started to say before her back hit the refrigerator. She looked worried because she knew she was cornered. “…like it.”

Alex stood in front of her and narrowed her eyes as she cut off a piece. She slowly put it in her mouth, and about a second later, she almost gagged. She looked at Maggie -- who had a sheepish smile on her face -- with a horrified expression.

“Oh, my god, that’s _horrible,_ ” Alex managed to say as she went over to the sink and spit it out. Alex couldn’t have described how it tasted, but she knew that that was definitely _not_ what it was supposed to taste like. What kind of seasoning had she put on it?

“How…why were you eating this? It’s disgusting,” Alex said, taking the paper plate out of Maggie’s hands easily and throwing it in the trash.

Maggie shrugged as she handed the fork to Alex to put in the sink. “Because you made it. And you looked so sad that it wasn’t very good.”

Alex looked back at Maggie. “I knew you didn’t like it. You’re a terrible liar.” But then she smiled, “Thank you for pretending you did, though. You didn’t have to.”

“Yeah, I did. It’s my job as your girlfriend to support your horrible cooking, even if I may actually have to call poison control.”

Alex rolled her eyes but leaned in and kissed Maggie, cupping her cheeks. How in the hell had she stumbled across someone like Maggie? And how did she get so lucky that Maggie liked her so much that she was willing to eat almost an entire half of a crappy omelet just to make her happy?

She was definitely making it very easy for Alex to fall in love with her.

Alex brushed back some of Maggie’s hair that had fallen out of her messy bun and said, “Never let me cook again.”

Maggie smiled, “That’s what you said last time.”

“I know, but I’m serious this time. Don’t even let me in the kitchen.”

Maggie let out a laugh, “Happy to.”

Alex turned and got out cereal boxes and coffee. Cereal and coffee she could do, because it required no cooking at all…and because there wasn’t anything else in the apartment.

“How much coffee do you want?”

“Um, about a gallon to wash that taste out of my mouth.”

Alex poured in the coffee grounds and got out the milk. “You know, I liked it better when you were pretending to like my cooking.”

Maggie scoffed and mumbled, “Yeah, never doing _that_ again.”

“So, are you excited?” Alex asked, pouring them both cereal. She supposed they could go out for breakfast, but Alex was too hungry to think about waiting at a café, even if it was just for coffee.

“About what?” Maggie said, feigning confusion as she sat back down on the stool again, watching Alex get their edible breakfast ready.

Alex looked at her, “About the ceremony. About officially becoming a cop. It’s in a week.” Alex was excited for Maggie, and even though Maggie was acting casual about it, Alex knew she was excited, too.

Maggie shrugged, but Alex saw a tiny smile peak out, “Yeah, I am. I just don’t want to go to the ceremony, it’s stupid.”

“How is it stupid? It’s going to be like a mini-graduation. You’d look so good in a little graduation cap with a diploma in your police uniform.”

Maggie narrowed her eyes, “Exactly. _That_ is why I don’t want to go, because I’m pretty sure they’d do something like that.”

Alex started the coffee machine and brought Maggie her cereal. “But it’s required.”

Maggie sighed and started eating, “I know, I just like to complain about it. You’re coming though, right?”

She asked the question so casually that it took Alex a second to realize what she had asked her. Alex wasn’t facing Maggie anymore, so she concentrated on the coffee machine while she tried to contain her smile. “Yeah, if you want me to.”

“Of course I want you to. I wouldn’t want you to miss the graduation caps. And I…don’t think I can get through it if you’re not there.”

Alex switched the mugs under the coffee maker to pour some for herself and turned back with Maggie’s coffee in her hand, hoping that her face didn’t reveal just how happy the things Maggie was saying were making her.

“I’ll have to bring a camera, just in case. For the scrapbook.”

Maggie pointed her finger at Alex, “You better not. If I see you with a camera, I’m kicking you out.”

Alex smirked and went to get her own coffee. She thought about telling Maggie that she might be able to finally tell her about her job when she became a cop, but decided against it because she wasn’t completely sure. And she didn’t want to get Maggie’s hopes up for nothing, just in case.

Besides, this was Maggie’s moment; Alex didn’t want to bother her with her own stuff. 

Thus, instead she asked, “How fancy is this thing anyway?” She sat down on the other stool next to Maggie with her coffee and cereal, and figured they’d be done at the same time knowing how slow Maggie ate.

“Pretty fancy. You’re going to have to wear a dress -- not that I’ll complain about it. Like at all,” she smirked and winked. “And, since this can technically count as a date, if there is no open bar--”

Alex sighed, “--I’m paying, I know. I’m paying for every date for the rest of the time.”

Maggie smirked. “Just until I feel like you’ve made it up to me…so yeah, forever.”

As Alex looked at Maggie, so comfortable and at ease in her apartment, she decided she’d better make sure that she would be able to tell Maggie about the DEO, and soon. Maggie didn’t hide anything from her, and it wasn’t fair that Alex did, especially because it was about something so huge. 

And Alex liked hearing Maggie say ‘forever.’ Even if it was to tease her about how she always used to forget to pay for dates. She thought about forever, and she thought about spending it with Maggie, and it made her happy. It scared her a little bit, how happy it made her and how in love with her she was, but she was definitely more excited than scared.

Alex hoped Maggie felt the same way, but she decided that she’d also better make sure about that, too, somehow before she said anything, just in case. Because she didn’t want to scare her away, and she couldn’t even imagine losing her. 

Alex didn’t realize that she had spaced out until she felt Maggie’s hand on her knee. Maggie tilted her head and asked, “Hey, you okay?”

Alex smiled and nodded, “Yeah, yeah. More than okay.”

\-------------------------  
\-------------------------

“J’onn, can I talk to you?” Alex asked as she hung up her guns but still kept some on a holster clipped to her thigh.

They had just gotten back from an Op and were all winding down back at the DEO. Alex got clapped on the back a couple of times from the other agents as they left the room, but Alex stayed because J’onn was still unloading all of his equipment.

She went over to him when he didn’t answer. “J’onn?”

“I heard you, I was just…” he unclipped a huge gun from his belt, “concentrating. What do you need?”

Alex couldn’t help it as she started fidgeting with her fingers, “I wanted to ask you about Maggie.”

J’onn groaned and looked at Alex, “Alex, I already told you--”

“I know, I know,” Alex said, holding hand up, “The whole President-fiasco--”

J’onn shook his head and his voice became more stern, “It wasn’t just a ‘fiasco,’ Alex. It almost compromised the DEO, and it’s been very difficult to get things back to normal here, as you know. The government has been on my ass about keeping this place and this whole organization a secret, so now is really not the time to be asking me about this.”

Alex sighed. She knew she shouldn’t be mad at J’onn about this, as it wasn’t his fault -- he was just the messenger. And she knew that he didn’t like doing this. “But--”

“Alex. You know that I would say go ahead if I could, but I really can’t. I’m sorry.”

Normally, Alex would let it go, but she really was frustrated about this whole thing, so she didn’t. “She found out about Kara being Supergirl like a month ago, so I don’t see why telling her about the DEO is any different.”

J’onn detached the last gun from his holder and started to walk out of the room, but at a normal pace so Alex could walk beside him.

“ _That_ was a mistake,” he said, “She already knows too much, and she’s just a pizza delivery girl, so there’s no reason for her to--”

Alex stopped walking, and J’onn turned around when he noticed she wasn’t beside him anymore.

“I’m sorry, _‘just’_ a pizza delivery girl?”

J’onn pursed his lips, “That’s not what I meant.”

Alex put a hand on her hip, trying not to let herself get angry. “So what did you mean?” She asked softly.

J’onn took a deep breath and crossed his arms, “I know that she’s your girlfriend, and I know that she’s not just a pizza delivery girl. But my superiors don’t care about that; they don’t see any reason for her to know.”

“But we told James. He comes in here all the time to see Kara. When we told him, he _‘just’_ worked at CatCo, and that, according to you, should not have been a good enough reason. But somehow, he was able to find out anyway.”

“That was because he knew Superman.”

Alex shrugged, “Yeah, and Maggie knows Supergirl.”

J’onn rubbed a hand over his face and leaned against the wall. “Alex. Do you remember what happened when James was first allowed to come to the DEO?” Alex nodded but J’onn continued anyway, “He convinced Winn to build him that Guardian suit using DEO supplies and he didn’t tell Kara about it. Do you remember how that all went down?”

“Yeah, but they moved past it. They’re more than fine now. It would’ve been stupid to break up over something like that, especially since Kara couldn’t get mad at him for trying to save the world when that’s what she does every damn day. And now they work together, so it all turned out great. Plus, Maggie’s not going to do that.”

J’onn raised his eyebrows. “How do you know?”

Alex felt like laughing, “Because not everyone wants to be a vigilante, J’onn. She’s not going to do anything like that. I know her, and I trust her, and I…” she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “It’s…it’s killing me that I can’t tell her. I hate it.” She took a deep breath, trying not to let her voice shake.

“I know, believe me.”

Alex shook her head, “No, you don’t know. She’s already…” she let out a breath, “she doesn’t ask me anymore, J’onn.”

J’onn furrowed his eyebrows and pulled out a desk chair for Alex to sit on. Alex slumped down into it, resting her head in her hands. “What do you mean?”

Alex looked up, trying to will herself not to start crying. “I mean that she doesn’t ask me. She doesn’t even ask _or_ joke around about my job anymore, because she knows I won’t…that I can’t tell her. She’s…given up trying. And I’m afraid that…” she took a deep breath and whispered, “I’m afraid that she’s going to give up on _me,_ J’onn.”

J’onn sat down on a desk chair he’d pulled over across from Alex and put his hand on her knee. “She’s not going to give up on you, Alex.”

Alex rubbed her eye and sighed, “How do you know?”

“Because I just know. She’s important to you, right?”

J’onn said, and Alex knew what he was trying to imply.

Alex nodded slightly, “Yeah.”

“And she knows that?”

“Yeah. I mean, I think she does.”

J’onn smiled a little bit, “Well, you should tell her just how important she is to you, Alex.”

Alex licked her lips. “But how can I tell her that she’s important to me and then still keep this huge part of my life a secret from her? …I can’t do that. It’s not fair to her.”

“She’ll understand.”

“But she shouldn’t have to understand, she should just…know.” Alex paused and looked J’onn in the eye. “In a couple of days, she’ll be a cop, J’onn.”

“Alex--”

But Alex held her hand up again to continue, “And I know that she won’t be a high-ranking cop, and it sounds like there will be still be no reason for her to know about the DEO, but…can you just think about it? Please?”

J’onn looked at her for a couple of seconds before he answered. “If she somehow figures it out before then, like I told you, then that could work because then I had nothing to do with it. If she doesn’t…we’ll both get in trouble if I say you can tell her. However, she will be a cop so maybe it won’t be…too bad.” He paused and Alex just waited. Then, he said, “I’ll think about it.”

Alex beamed and hugged him. “Thank you,” she whispered. She pulled back and J’onn had a small smile on his face.

“She better be worth it,” he said, and winked at her.

Alex smiled, mostly to herself. “Believe me, she is.”

\-------------------------  
\-------------------------

Alex had a strange déjà vu moment, standing in front of Maggie’s apartment pacing back and forth in her red dress and high heels, waiting for Maggie to open the door.

It was Saturday night, the night of the police academy ‘graduation’ ceremony and Alex was about as nervous as she was when she had stood in front of Maggie’s door for their first date. She kept glancing over her shoulder, wondering when Vick was going to come storming out of his apartment to yell at her, and smiled at the memory. 

Maggie’s last day at Stilton’s had been the day before, but neither of them had seen each other in a couple of days because Alex couldn’t get off work early enough and Maggie had been working double shifts to make a little more money her last week. 

Alex ran a hand through her hair and reminded herself to breathe because even though she was excited for this, she was also extremely nervous about meeting all of Maggie’s new colleagues. And she was also wondering whether her dress was fancy enough, or if the way she had curled her hair looked good. She took a deep breath, trying to tell herself not to worry about it too much. She had to focus on Maggie because this was her day, and Alex had to be calm enough for the both of them.

She had knocked on the door ten seconds earlier, and heard the familiar shuffling and banging coming from inside as Maggie was no doubt trying to do five things at the last minute.

And then the door opened. “Why didn’t you just use your-- _Woah_ ,” Maggie said, her jaw dropping.

She just stood there in her police uniform, which Alex hadn’t gotten to see her in yet, with her mouth open, staring at Alex. Maggie looked really hot in her uniform, but Alex was more focused on the look on Maggie’s face right then.

Maggie looked down and back up, slowly closing her mouth. She swallowed and Alex smiled as she looked down at her own dress. “Do you like it?”

Maggie raised her eyebrows, “Do I _like_ it? Alex, you look…” she gestured up and down, “I mean…you look…”

Alex smiled but scrunched her nose, “Is it fancy enough?”

Maggie looked at Alex for a second and then held out her hand. The second Alex touched it, Maggie pulled her into the apartment. Then, she stood up on her toes because she wasn’t wearing shoes yet and kissed Alex as if she couldn’t wait anymore to do it. Alex moaned in surprise.

“Fancy _enough_? It’s…more than enough. It’s…actually, it’s too much. For me. To handle right now.” She smirked and kissed Alex again, “So…I think we need to stay here.” 

Alex smiled but started to pull away, “Maggie--”

Maggie started running her fingers up and down Alex’s arms, continuing, “And…as much as I like you _in_ that dress, I think maybe I would also be okay with--”

Alex laughed, “Maggie, we need to go to the ceremony. We’re already late.”

“But--”

Alex didn’t really want to, but she put her finger on Maggie’s lips as she tried to lean in again and shook her head. “As much as I would love to, and believe me, I would _love_ to, we need to go.”

Maggie pouted and sighed, “Fine.” She turned around, but not before giving Alex another once-over, and grabbed her shoes.

“You know, the faster the ceremony is over, the faster we can come back here.”

Maggie looked over her shoulder, “Ooh, I like the way you think.”

Alex rolled her eyes and was trying not to smile. Maggie grabbed her police cap off the counter but didn’t put it on, which Alex would’ve liked to see. She’d have to put it on eventually. Alex couldn’t stop smiling at Maggie’s reaction to her dress, which she had just found and decided to wear about two hours ago instead of another dress. And then she thought that she might have to wear dresses more often.

When Maggie was finally ready, she took Alex’s hand again and locked the door behind them when they left. “Where have you been hiding this dress? And why in god’s name has it not made an appearance until now?”

Alex pushed her elbow into Maggie’s side, “Because I didn’t think you could handle it, obviously.”

Maggie scoffed, “Yeah, you were right about that.” Then, she ran a hand through her hair and stopped walking. She turned Alex around to face her and put her hand on the back of Alex’s neck, pulling her down to kiss her slowly. 

Alex couldn’t help herself as she sank into the kiss, and only pulled back to breathe when Maggie did.

Maggie bit her lip, “I forgot to finish my sentence earlier. I meant to say that you look beautiful, Alex. All those guys are going to be so jealous, I can’t wait.”

Alex smiled at Maggie’s expression, which was a mixture of excitement and longing, before she started walking again, and said, “Don’t think your uniform isn’t doing things to me, too, you know. I’m just better able to control myself.”

Maggie squeezed her hand, “Yeah, we’ll see about that.”

\-------------------------

A fifteen minute drive later, which was more difficult than it needed to be because Maggie couldn’t seem to keep her hands to herself, and they were at the ceremony. There weren’t a huge number of people there, but by the time Maggie and Alex walked up to the door, they’d already said hi to three people that Maggie knew.

Alex’s dresses were usually not as comfortable as this one was right now, because she had decided to strap only one hidden gun to herself. She figured that since this was a ceremony for the NCPD, there would be no shortage of weapons available if necessary.

Maggie was holding her hand and not leaving any space between their arms as they walked into the building and were immediately greeted by another one of Maggie’s colleagues. Once they had made introductions and started talking about police things, Alex went to go get them drinks. She sighed in relief when it was an open bar.

When she came back, the guy was just leaving and Maggie held out her hand to take her drink from Alex. “Don’t ever leave me with him again, he’s a jackass.”

Alex laughed, “Noted.”

Then Maggie leaned against the table next to them and turned serious. “Hey, so I forgot to tell you but...yesterday…” she paused, and Alex just waited patiently for her to continue, wondering what in the world she was talking about. “My boss, my new boss, I guess, said he wants to place me in the Science division at the NCPD.”

Alex’s eyes widened. “The Science division?”

Alex tried to think about which branch of the NCPD, if any, worked with the DEO sometimes, and she was pretty sure it was the Science division. It was rare, and everyone at the DEO hated when cops crashed their cases, but if Maggie was going to be in the Science division, then that meant…

“Yeah. He said because of my background it would be the best place to put me, eventually.”

Alex smiled and realized that this meant Maggie could be told about the DEO. And then she thought that maybe J’onn would make Alex wait to tell her because she wouldn’t be a high enough rank yet to actually work with them. Alex would have to double check to make sure that neither J’onn nor her would get in trouble if she told her. But even so…eventually, and even if it took a while, Maggie would be working with them. With her.

Maggie saw the excitement on Alex’s face and mirrored it.

Alex realized that she hadn’t said anything, so she squeezed Maggie’s hand and said, “That’s great! I mean, if you want to do it, I…I think that’s great.”

“Yeah, I do. I think--”

Just then, someone tapped on the microphone and announced that the ceremony was going to start. Alex looked at Maggie, whose excitement was now replaced with a nervous look. She had acted completely fine the entire way over, and now, it seemed, she was finally getting nervous about actually going up on the stage for the ceremony.

Alex put her drink on a table and took Maggie’s police cap from under her arm. “Maggie, are you okay?”

Maggie just nodded and almost downed her entire drink. “Yup. I’m fine.”

“Maggie,” Alex said, taking her drink from her so she couldn’t chug the rest of it, “this is exciting. You have nothing to be nervous about.”

Maggie sighed. “I know, I know, I’m just…” she took a deep breath. “Sit somewhere I can see you, okay?”

Alex smiled and brushed some of Maggie’s hair back, “Yeah, of course.” She kissed Maggie’s cheek and placed her police cap on her head, much to Maggie’s dismay, as one of her colleagues called her to join them. 

It took Alex another minute to find an open chair, and she ended up in the middle of the room in an aisle seat. She hoped that maybe Maggie could see her from here. The ceremony started and Alex’s eyes sought out Maggie in the line of police officers on stage.

When she saw her she smiled, because Maggie still looked nervous, even though it was obvious she was trying to hide it. After the police chief had made a speech, Maggie finally found her in the crowd and Alex gave her a little wave. Then, she took out her phone and held it up like she was going to take a picture and put it back down when she saw Maggie’s glare.

Maggie shook her head the tiniest bit and Alex pouted. She mouthed, “Please?” and after a second, Maggie rolled her eyes and mouthed back, “One.”

Alex beamed and was about to take the picture when her screen lit up with “DEO.” Alex frowned and quickly put her phone down, holding it tightly so the vibrating wouldn’t be so loud. She hadn’t turned it completely off just in case, and she was only sort of glad she did.

They started calling out names and Alex kind of zoned out, trying to figure out how she was going to answer the phone without disrupting the ceremony. She didn’t want to leave because Maggie hadn’t gone up yet, but she couldn’t talk in her seat either because the lady next to her was already glaring at her.

She looked back up at Maggie, who was inching closer to front of the line to receive her badge, to see her looking confused and worried back at her. Alex tried to give her a reassuring smile but was sure it wasn’t very convincing. Why did the DEO need her at the worst times? This hadn’t happened in a while, and Alex had been wondering when it was inevitably going to happen again. The phone stopped vibrating before Alex could figure out what to do, and she decided that they’d probably just call her again. She couldn’t even remember the last time she hadn’t answered a call from the DEO.

Instead of calling her again, she got a message from J’onn that read:

 _**Alex, I assume you’re not answering because you know that there is going to be an attack at the new police recruit swearing-in ceremony tonight**_

Alex furrowed her eyebrows. What was J’onn talking about? There was going to be an attack, here?

Another two messages came in one after the other:

 _**Tell me if the alien is already there, and if you are in any position to speak to me right now. We think it’s going after the police chief**_

_**We’re bringing back up, stand down until we arrive**_

“What the hell?” Alex muttered under her breath.

The lady next to her shushed her and Alex just glared back before turning her attention to her phone. Her heart was pounding but she tried not to freak out. J’onn thought there was an alien that was going to attack the ceremony? And that Alex was hiding from it and couldn’t answer her phone? That meant it was probably already here.

Then, Alex heard the announcer say, “Officer Magdalena Sawyer,” and she whipped her head up. Maggie was walking up to the stage and the chief handed her a certificate and pinned her badge to her suit. Alex couldn’t help but smile despite the situation, and then Maggie was done and walking off the stage to stand to the side. She turned and looked at Alex, who again gave her a half smile before looking back down at her phone.

She was trying to decide what to do, her mind in a million different places at once, and then a loud _Bang_ came from the back of the auditorium.

Alex and a few other people stood up, and almost everyone turned around in their chairs. There was murmuring and several police officers getting out guns, but no one could see where the sound was coming from. Alex really wished she had brought weapons that would work against aliens. Her one measly gun wouldn’t be able to do anything.

Two officers had their own guns pointed at the door, and it was quiet for a couple of seconds until there was another _Bang_ and the entire middle of the wall was taken out. The alien, who Alex could only describe as looking kind of like the Dominator but green and with bright red eyes, stepped into the auditorium as people screamed.

“Shit,” Alex said under her breath, trying not to get knocked over from people panicking and running all over the place. Why the hell hadn’t she brought DEO weapons? There were about twenty officers shooting at the alien, but it wasn’t doing any good.

She took off her high heels and saw one officer firing with two guns and he had another one in his back pocket, so she grabbed that one just in case to give to Maggie when she found her. She looked around and didn’t see the police chief anywhere.

Then, Alex tried to turn around but got jostled.

“Maggie!” She shouted, trying to find her in the crowd as the alien kept coming forward, knocking people out of his way easily.

The DEO agents were going to be here soon and would hopefully be able to take out the alien, so Alex focused on finding Maggie. She couldn’t even do anything, and she felt helpless. And she hated feeling helpless. 

“Maggie!” She shouted again, and then the alien suddenly shot heat lasers out of his eyes similar to how Kara could and burned through an entire row of chairs, which sent people screaming. Alex started to run towards where she thought Maggie had been before the alien arrived and then heard:

“Alex?”

Alex stopped running and looked to her left, and suddenly Maggie crashed into her and they both stumbled a little bit.

“Oof, sorry, I was running a little fast,” Maggie said as they both managed to get their balance, Maggie holding onto Alex’s arms like her life depended on it. “Are you okay?”

Alex breathed a sigh of relief as she started looking Maggie over, making sure she wasn’t hurt. “I’m fine, are _you_ okay?”

“Yeah. Shit, Alex, what is that thing?” Maggie asked as they both looked at the alien, who was burning through row after row of chairs.

But Alex didn’t answer and grabbed Maggie’s arm, stuffing the gun she had grabbed for her in her hand while running towards the first place that looked safe. She thought that maybe wearing a dress hadn’t been the best idea. And especially a _red_ dress that screamed ‘Look over here and shoot at me.’ But how in the world could she have known this was going to happen?

Alex could feel heat from behind her as the alien aimed his eyes pretty close towards the two of them. Her bare feet smacked against the floor as they ran and she cringed when she felt a broken piece of glass cut the bottom of her foot, but she kept running on the balls of her feet.

She didn’t slow down until she found something they could hide behind and pulled Maggie down onto the floor with her. Alex had to catch her breath for a second before she turned her foot to see how bad the cut was. It was bleeding, but it didn’t look too big; Alex didn’t want to take the glass out just in case.

Maggie furrowed her eyebrows when she saw Alex’s foot, “Shit.”

Alex held onto Maggie’s hand, turning her foot back so they didn’t have to look at it. “It’s fine, Maggie. I’m fine.”

Somewhere along the way, Maggie’s certificate and police cap had disappeared, and her hair wasn’t quite so styled anymore. Alex wondered what _she_ looked like, but knew that that didn’t matter right now. All that mattered was that she had found Maggie, and they were safe. For now.

Alex thought she heard DEO agents coming into the building so she peaked out from behind their safe space, and sure enough, they were there.

“What _is_ that thing?” Maggie asked again, mostly to herself, also poking her head out slightly.

“I think it’s a Vieq’urk, because of the heat vision,” Alex said before she realized she probably shouldn’t have said it.

Maggie looked at her curiously, no doubt wondering how she knew that. Alex thought about backtracking, but decided that it wouldn’t be worth it right now. So, she just pursed her lips and turned away from Maggie. She held the gun in her hand and started to crawl out before she felt Maggie grab her hand and yank her back.

“Alex, you can’t go out there,” she said sternly, confusion and worry etched on every inch of her face. 

Alex looked at her, trying to let her know that it would be okay, “I have to, I have to get--”

“No! You are _not_ leaving to play hero or something. We’re safe here, it can’t get us. And the only way you’re going out there is if I come with you.”

Alex looked at Maggie, who just raised her eyebrows. She supposed two people would be better than one, but she had to get to the DEO agents and all she and Maggie had were two useless guns.

“Maggie,” Alex said, and then paused for a couple seconds. She heard more people screaming and DEO agents’ guns didn’t seem to be working. Alex hoped that Kara was also coming, because she was probably the only one who could take down this alien. 

A wave of heat flew over them both and Alex covered Maggie. When it was over, they both straightened back up to crouching positions.

Alex was coming up with a plan but then she looked back at Maggie. And she decided something.

Alex dropped her own gun and put Maggie’s on the ground so she could grab both of her hands in hers. She thought about what J’onn had told her a few days ago about telling Maggie how important she was to her. And she thought she’d better do it before they were going to go out there together. Just in case.

Maggie looked confused at Alex’s expression, but Alex just took a deep breath.

“Maggie, I need to--”

Just then, another wave of heat slammed into the half wall they were hiding behind and burned through it. Alex just barely managed to react fast enough to push Maggie away so she didn’t get burned.

Then, Alex felt searing pain on her left side and her vision went black for a second. She heard Maggie saying her name and opened her eyes to see her leaning over her and trying to drag her away to another safe place, but it was blurry. Alex blinked and everything felt slow…and then she blacked out.

\-------------------------

Meanwhile, Maggie didn’t have the pleasure of blacking out, and had to deal with seeing her girlfriend unconscious on the floor -- which she wasn’t doing a very good job of. Half of the left side of Alex’s torso was burned and Maggie didn’t know what to do.

Actually, Maggie realized, it wasn’t exactly burned -- it wasn’t turning the color Maggie knew burns were supposed to turn. The skin was instead slowly becoming a weird mixture of green and red and gray and Maggie couldn’t breathe.

“Holy shit… _Holy shit,_ Alex. Alex, can you hear me?” She said, cradling her limp head in her arms.

When Alex didn’t say anything, Maggie took a few deep breaths and grabbed both of their guns. Maggie was sure they weren’t going to do any good, but it would have to do for now. She willed herself not to start crying as muttered, “Shit…” under her breath over and over.

Thinking rationally right then was difficult, and she didn’t quite know if she was going to be able to leave Alex on the ground to get help. She squeezed Alex’s hand and shut her eyes, trying to remember what she had learned at the academy for situations like this. As far as she knew, though, they hadn’t thought her how to deal with fire-wielding aliens. So, Maggie blocked out everything so she could focus on trying to figure out what to do.

Which is why she didn’t notice when everything went quiet, until she heard:

“Maggie!”

Maggie opened her eyes and looked back down at Alex as if she had said it. Then, it only took Maggie a split second to realize that it was Kara.

When she saw Kara, well, actually Supergirl, running towards her, she let out a relieved breath. 

Maggie looked behind her at the scene in the auditorium. The alien seemed to be collapsed on the ground, not moving, although most of the debris around it was on fire. There were a few people decked out in black with weapons wandering around, no doubt looking for survivors, and some people limping out of the building.

Maggie turned her attention back to Kara as Kara kneeled down beside her to inspect Alex.

Maggie’s voice was shaking as she told Kara what happened. “The alien…it-it burned her and I can’t…I don’t-- It’s not the right color, Kara. I don’t know what kind of alien or…or what it did to her or--”

She felt Kara’s hand on her shoulder and she stopped rambling. “Maggie, hey. It’s…going to be fine.”

Maggie just looked at her. She looked like she was about to start crying as well, “How do you know that?”

Kara bit her lip. “I-I don’t know. I just…we need to figure out who’s going to take her back to headquarters to treat this.”

Maggie just furrowed her eyebrows, “Headquarters? Where she works? But why not--” Maggie’s mouth stayed open for a second as all the pieces started to fit together in her head. Alex worked with Supergirl, she knew what kind of alien that was, and those agents in the building with the alien weapons were wearing all black -- head to toe.

Maggie’s eyes widened, “Oh, my god. She’s part of that…that top-secret alien attack-defense group thing.” Maggie squeezed her eyes shut for a second. “I overheard about it at work one time and I don’t remember what it’s called but…oh my god,” she said again, this time looking at Kara. “Is she?”

Kara nodded.

Maggie let out a breath, torn between being relieved about finally, _finally_ figuring that out and being worried sick about Alex. She looked back down at her girlfriend, who was still unconscious, squeezed her hand, and checked her pulse, which was still beating, albeit slowly.

They heard footsteps coming from behind them and then a deep voice said, “Supergirl, did you find-- Oh.”

Maggie turned her head to see who she believed to be Alex’s boss, from Alex’s vague descriptions of him. The man knelt down beside them and peered at Alex.

“What happened?” He asked, looking at Kara. Maggie got a little annoyed that he didn’t ask _her_ about what happened, especially since he knew that Kara had probably been preoccupied with the alien.

Before Kara could say anything, Maggie piped up. “She got burned.” J’onn looked at her and she continued, “And she fell unconscious a couple minutes ago from the pain, I think.”

The man stood back up and held his arms out. “Let me take her.”

Maggie squeezed Alex’s hand tighter in response. “What? No! I mean…I’m not leaving her.”

“Well I’m sorry, Maggie, but she needs to come with me to get treated or that is going to get a lot worse, very fast.”

Maggie pursed her lips and felt herself getting angrier. She knew that it was probably just because she was mad at the world in general for letting Alex get hurt while she barely had a scratch on her, but she was tired and just wanted to see Alex okay again.

“Then I’m coming with you,” she commanded.

The man sighed and Kara started to say something but he talked over her, “Maggie, I know you’re her girlfriend, but I can’t take you with me because it’s not enough to--”

“Not enough?” Maggie said, and her voice got louder until she was practically shouting. “It’s not enough that I’m her girlfriend? Not enough that…that she’s important to me? That she is _everything_ to me? That I _love her?_ ”

…And everything stopped for a split second.

She heard a tiny gasp from Kara and Maggie’s immediate thought was, _Wait._ And then her second thought was, _…Oh._ She looked back down at Alex; Kara and the man were silent.

She loved Alex. At least she just…said she did. Maggie took a deep breath and repeated it in her head. She loved her.

Maggie didn’t know whether to smile, laugh, or cry. She almost didn’t notice when the man took Alex out of her arms slowly, but she let him. She followed Alex’s limp body with her eyes as the man stood up with a grunt.

“Kara, you can bring her to see Alex, when she wants to come,” the man said, but Maggie didn’t really register what he said. She heard a _whoosh_ of air and then felt Kara’s hand on her knee.

Maggie just sat on the ground, trying to figure out how she felt about what she had just said.

“Maggie?” She heard Kara say. “Are you okay?”

Maggie blinked and looked at Kara, who had a small smile on her face. “Yeah, sorry, I’m…I’m fine. I just…I don’t know how to…I can’t really…”

Kara squeezed her knee. “C’mon, you can think while we’re flying. I didn’t even get a chance to tell J’onn you already knew about the DEO, but…I guess that turned out okay,” she said with a little laugh.

The DEO, _that’s_ what it was called. Maggie managed a laugh and then said, “Please, Kara…don’t…tell her, okay?”

Kara looked worried but nodded. “Okay, yeah. I won’t tell her.”

Maggie nodded and wrapped her arms around Kara when she asked her if she was ready to go. A second later they were in the air and Maggie was still shell-shocked from the whole evening the entire way to Alex’s work. To the DEO. Because that was where Alex worked. Alex. Who she loved.

When they finally landed at the doors to the DEO, Maggie didn’t even have a chance to look impressed before they headed inside to the infirmary. The doctors wouldn’t let them go in to see Alex as they were still working on her, so Maggie sat outside the room on a rock-hard chair, but only after they reassured her that Alex was going to be fine.

Ten minutes later, Kara came back and sat down next to her. Maggie looked over at her through her fingers and then sat up straighter, bringing her hands away from her face.

“How are you feeling?” Kara asked.

“Oh, you know,” she said with a deep breath. “Fine.”

Kara pursed her lips and looked unsure about whether or not to talk to her. Finally, she asked, “Do you want to…talk about it?”

Maggie bit her lip, and then shook her head. “No…not really. I mean, I just need to…to think for a while, about it, I think.”

“Okay. Well, we _are_ going to be here for a while, so if you do…”

Maggie sighed. “It’s just that…I don’t really want to talk about it with _you._ I mean, not that you’re not a great person to talk to or anything, but I kind of…”

Kara nodded, “No, no I get it. You want to talk about it with her.” She nodded in Alex’s direction through the window to the examination room.

Maggie smiled a little bit, “Yeah. I’m sorry.”

Kara shrugged, “It’s fine. I totally get it. We can talk about something else.”

She didn’t continue and it stayed silent for about ten seconds before...

Maggie took a deep breath, “I mean, I said it in front of _you._ In front her _sister,_ and her _boss,_ before I said it to her. How…How weird is that?”

“It’s not weird, Maggie. You were just…I mean, you were getting pretty heated up and it just came out. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

“Yeah, but…I-I didn’t even know I was going to say it until after I had said it. I mean, I guess I had kind of…thought about it before maybe once or twice but I never…I mean, what if she doesn’t…”

Kara patted her knee. “I think you should tell her before you overthink this. Or freak out about it.”

“Oh, I am way past freaking out,” Maggie said, scoffing. “Now I’m freaking out about freaking out about it.”

Maggie looked at Kara to see an amused expression on her face. “We should probably talk about something else. It is kind of weird to talk about this with you. Or I’ll just…be silent so you can think about it.”

Maggie nodded and put her head back down in her hands. She wasn’t sure if letting her brain think about it was the best option, but she couldn’t _not_ think about it. Right now, she just knew that she needed to get her shit together by the time Alex woke up. And if she had to sit here for hours, overthinking and analyzing everything…then she was going to do it.

\-------------------------  
\-------------------------

Two nights later, Alex was able to go home, but the doctors had her on bed rest for another two days (which Alex had successfully negotiated down from three). 

Maggie and Kara had seen her at the DEO when she woke up in the infirmary, but Alex couldn’t even be happy about the fact that Maggie now knew about the DEO because she had been acting weird. Really weird.

Alex didn’t know why, and asked Kara about it, but Kara told her she couldn’t tell her. And then she told her to talk to Maggie, but Maggie kept avoiding Alex’s questions about what was wrong. Maggie just kept saying that nothing was wrong and would then change the subject.

And Alex was pretty sure she was half out of it the entire time, which made the whole thing more confusing. 

Kara flew in with Alex, much to Alex’s dismay, into Alex’s apartment through the window. Maggie was sitting on the couch waiting for them, and when they flew in, she jumped up in the surprise.

“Jeez, Kara, warn a girl next time,” Maggie said, but she had a smile on her face regardless. “Hey, you.”

Alex smiled, “Hey.”

“Sorry about that,” Kara said. She carried Alex to her room and carefully placed her on the left side of the bed. Despite Alex insisting that she didn’t need their help, Kara and Maggie got her in a comfortable position and then Kara said, “Well, I’ll leave you two alone for a while.”

“You’re leaving already?” Alex asked her, but Kara just glanced at Maggie.

“Yeah. I have to um…J’onn needs me,” she plastered a smile on her face and kissed Alex’s forehead. Alex just furrowed her eyebrows and looked at Maggie, who was pointedly not looking at her. “I’ll come check on you…sometime. Maybe tomorrow, I don’t know. I’m gonna go.”

Kara was out of the room before Alex even finished saying goodbye. Maggie pursed her lips and looked at Alex.

“What’s going on?” Alex asked, now even more confused, but also more sure that whatever had happened at the infirmary was indeed weird.

Maggie pulled over the stool in the corner of Alex’s room to sit next to the bed. She smiled at Alex and took her hand, ignoring her question. “How are you feeling?”

Alex narrowed her eyes. “Pretty good,” she said suspiciously. “How about you?”

“Fine.”

“Are you sure?” Alex asked.

“Yeah. I mean, I’m…I’m actually,” Maggie took a deep breath and stood up, letting go of Alex’s hand. “I’m actually more than fine, now.” She started pacing around the room slowly and ran a hand through her hair.

“Okay, that’s good, I guess. But…you’re acting weird. Both you _and_ Kara, actually.”

Maggie turned back to her and licked her lips. She still didn’t say anything, and Alex was starting to get really worried.

“Maggie, seriously, what is--”

“ItoldyoursisterthatIloveyou,” Maggie blurted out.

She said it so fast that Alex wasn’t sure what exactly she had heard. “What?” 

Maggie sat back down on the stool and looked Alex in the eye this time as she repeated it a bit slower. “I…told your sister -- and your boss, I guess -- that I love you.”

Maggie seemed to breathe a sigh of relief and her eyes were shining. Alex just looked at her, trying to process what she had just said. And before Alex got a chance to think of what to say, Maggie stood up and started pacing again. Then, she started talking and couldn’t seem to stop.

“It kind of happened while you were out. I mean, you blacked out after you got burned and then Kara found us while I was trying to figure out what to do. And your boss, J’onn, I think? He came over and he wanted to take you and I got mad at him and then…and then he said that being your girlfriend wasn’t enough to take me to the DEO with you. So then I just got even angrier and then kind of blurted out that I love you. And--”

“Maggie--”

Maggie turned back around and put a hand up. “Wait, just…hold on one second. I need to get this out.” She took a deep breath and continued, “And then…what was really weird was that I started freaking out about it. I mean, I _really_ freaked out about it. I-I didn’t know how I felt about it, which scared me. But then I thought, why would I have said it if I didn’t mean it? But, you know, I also was pretty distressed about you being almost dead, and I thought that maybe I only said it because I thought you were going to die. And then, of course, I started freaking out _about_ freaking out about it and _that_ didn’t help much. So…I thought about it for hours and hours and I realized that…” she turned back to Alex again, “I do love you, Alex. I…I did freak out about it, but it was only because it scared me how much of a relief it was to say it. Because I didn’t even know I had wanted to say it in the first place. So…yeah.” She bit her lip and sat back down on the stool.

Alex just laid there, letting all that sink in. After a couple of seconds, she said “So--” but Maggie interrupted her yet again.

“And I don’t want you to feel like you have to say back, if you…don’t want to or whatever. I just…I didn’t want to scare you with this but it was eating me up inside and I couldn’t wait anymore to tell you. I mean, I already waited two days while you were half out of it in the infirmary, which drove me crazy. Plus, the fact that Kara and J’onn knew and you didn’t was weird, and I knew I had to tell you. Anyway…I just…I guess I just want to know, though, either way. Whether you…do or not.” She swallowed and looked worried.

Alex was trying not to smile. She’d never seen Maggie like this. Usually _she_ was the one acting like this.

“So, you want to know…if I love you, back,” Alex said slowly.

Maggie took a deep breath and was about to say something but then closed her mouth and just nodded slightly.

Alex bit her cheek. “Okay. Can you, um…can you open that tiny drawer over there on my dresser?” She pointed to her dresser with her right arm as it still hurt a bit to stretch the skin on her left side.

Maggie blinked and just looked at her, confused. Alex gave her a tiny smile and she slowly got up. “Okay…” she said as she walked around the bed.

She glanced back once at Alex before she found the tiny drawer on the top corner of Alex’s dresser and slid it out slowly.

Alex knew exactly what was in that drawer: Two pairs of earrings, a locket, a badge, and…

She heard Maggie suck in a short breath and it was silent for a couple of seconds before…

“You kept this?” Maggie asked softly, so quiet that Alex almost didn’t hear her.

Maggie’s back was still to her, and Alex didn’t say anything until she slowly turned around and looked back up at Alex.

In her hand was the receipt from the first time they had met. It was still wrinkled from when Maggie had crumpled it, and now Maggie was holding it in her left hand like it could break if she so much as breathed on it.

Alex smiled and nodded, and Maggie looked at her for another second before walking back around the bed towards Alex and sitting on the stool as if in a trance.

Alex waited until she looked back up at her and then took a deep breath. “Maggie, it took me less than ten minutes after meeting you to know that you were…that I didn’t want you to leave. Ever. I mean, you were – and you still are – funny and smart and so beautiful and…well, you were a little bit intimidating, actually. And I couldn’t even talk to you but you made me feel like I could. And…now I get to wake up next to you every morning and…and you tease me and make me food and it’s actually _good_ food and…and when you tell me that I am enough for you, I believe it. You eat my crappy food and pretend you like it and you tell me that I’m beautiful and I believe it. That receipt, Maggie…that receipt is a reminder of one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. So…” she took a deep breath, “if it isn’t obvious by now, I do love you, Maggie. I mean, of course I love you. How could I n--”

But Maggie didn’t let her finish and crashed their lips together like Alex was oxygen and she was suffocating, which caused the back of Alex’s head hit the headboard -- but she smiled through the kiss because she didn’t care.

It took Alex about five seconds to realize that Maggie’s bottom lip was shaking when she opened her mouth, and that her lips tasted salty. Alex couldn’t help it as she furrowed her eyebrows and slowly pulled back. 

Maggie kept her eyes closed but when Alex saw that she was crying, she cupped her face and started wiping her tears away with her thumbs.

“Maggie…why…why are you crying?” Alex asked, trying to smile and not be too worried.

Maggie opened her eyes and it took her a couple of seconds to catch her breath enough to say, “I’m sorry, I’m-I’m really happy, I just…it’s just that…I-I didn’t keep mine.”

Alex couldn’t help it as a tiny laugh escaped her, and she immediately cringed when her stomach hurt. She took her left hand away from Maggie’s face and gingerly touched her bandage, and then focused back on Maggie.

“Vick…he-he threw it away, and I didn’t even th-think to…” she said in between hiccupping. She leaned her head back and wiped her own tears away, and Alex just kept smiling.

“It’s okay, Maggie. I didn’t really expect…I mean, this one--” she slowly took the receipt from Maggie’s hand, and turned it over so she could see Maggie’s handwriting on the back, “--you wrote on this one. This one is…it can be ours.”

Maggie took a deep shaky breath and let it out. She took the receipt back from Alex and just stared at it for a few seconds, tracing her fingers over the creases.

“I can’t believe you kept this for almost five months.”

Alex bit her lip. “Well, I’m going to keep it for…forever, so…I’m glad you’re impressed with five months because it isn’t even that long.”

Maggie looked back up at her and smiled. She shook her head slightly, “You’re such a dork, Alex.”

Alex just smiled back. “But you love me.”

Maggie nodded and kissed her again, slower this time, before pulling back and saying, “ _And_ I love you.”

A couple hours later, Maggie was lying in the bed facing Alex on her side. Maggie had helped Alex slide down on the bed so she was lying on her back, which was the only comfortable position for her. 

Maggie was playing with Alex’s fingers and it was silent, but neither of them minded.

“So…you really told my sister before you told me?”

Maggie stopped and Alex could see her looking at her from the corner of her eye. Alex turned her head to face her. 

Maggie bit her lip, “You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

Alex shook her head and smirked. “Not a chance.”

“Well, I suppose I have enough things to tease you about, so you can have _one._ By the way, I did bring pizza. If you’re hungry,” Maggie said as she smiled and kissed one of Alex’s fingers. 

Alex furrowed her eyebrows, “You brought pizza?” Maggie nodded. “But you hate pizza.”

It did make sense, as Maggie had told her the first time Alex had suggested getting pizza, that she hated it. (“You try smelling pizza every night for years and tell me if you still feel like eating it.”)

Maggie shrugged one shoulder, “Yeah, but…you love pizza. And I love you…ergo--”

“You love pizza, now?”

“What? No, I can _tolerate_ pizza.”

Alex tried not to laugh so her stomach wouldn’t start hurting again. “I’m not really that hungry, right now. And I know you’re tired and don’t feel like getting up.”

“Wow, you know me so well. It’s like you…love me or something,” she said with a wink.

Alex just smiled, “I do love you, Maggie. That’s why I’m--” And then she suddenly remembered something and squeezed Maggie’s hand. “Oh! I forgot to tell you.”

“What?”

“Are you still thinking of going into the Science division at the NCPD?”

“Yeah, why?”

Alex beamed. “Because sometimes…the DEO works with the local cops. And specifically, the Science division.”

”Really?” Maggie said as her eyes widened. 

Alex nodded. “So…we could be working together. It is pretty rare but…”

Maggie just furrowed her eyebrows but said, “Huh. That’s…that’s great.”

“Yeah?”

Maggie was silent for a couple seconds, and then she said, “Yeah…Sorry, I’m just…thinking. Do you…think that, you know, if we hadn’t met four months ago, with the whole delivery thing, that maybe we would have eventually met on a crime scene or something?”

Alex hadn’t thought about that. “Um yeah, I guess. Why?”

Maggie looked at her, “So, do you think we would’ve…that it would’ve turned out like this? I mean, if we had met like that?”

“Well, I don’t know…us federal agents don’t really like it when local cops crash our crime scenes, so…I probably would’ve had to yell at you.”

Maggie smiled and bumped Alex’s shoulder softly.

Alex smiled back. “What matters, though, is that I love you _now._ And that…you know, I think that if we ever do get a chance to work together…I think we’ll make a good team. Don’t you think?”

Maggie just looked at her with a small smile on her face and nodded. “Yeah, I think we’ll make a pretty good team. Also, we should probably get Kara a thank you card or something.”

Alex couldn't help a laugh as she squeezed Maggie's hand.

"She would love that."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ......... :)
> 
> Okay. I stg I am not touching this AU anymore. (aha, past me was so funny...thinking I wasn't going to continue this.....)
> 
> If you find you may want more of this AU....you can scroll on down and click that little Next Work button if you want.... :)


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